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THE PILGRIMS 
IN THEIR THREE HOMES 

ENGLAND, HOLLAND, AMERICA 



WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS 



2)ctt6 fecit 



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BOSTON AND NEVS' YORK -; 

HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY^: 

1900 







COPYBIGHT, 1898, BY WILLIAM ELLIOT GRTFFIS 
ALL KIGUTS RESERVED 






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IN GRATEFUL MEMORY 
OF 

MY ENGLISH ANCESTORS 

OF NOTTINGHAM AND DEVON 

THE SHIRES MOST CLOSELY CONNECTED WITH 

PILGRIM HISTORY 

AND IN HEARTY ADMIRATION OF THE 

MIGHTY ENGLAnAIjVHICH IS 

AND THE NOBLBb ENGLAND 

THAT IS YET TO BE 



PREFACE 

On Monday evening, the 24th of February, 
1890, at its meeting- in Horticultural Hall, the 
Congregational Club of Boston voted, upon the 
recommendation of the Hon. Samuel R. Thayer, 
a New Englander, and then Minister Plenipoten- 
tiary of the United States at the Hague, to erect 
a memorial at Delfshaven, as follows : — 

Whereas, Remembering the hospitality of the free 
republic o£ Holland, so generously bestowed upon the 
Pilgrims, who, after twelve years' residence in Amster- 
dam and Leyden, sailed from Delfshaven on a voyage 
which was completed at Plymouth Rock, it is fitting 
that we, members of Congregational Clubs throughout 
the United States, should unite in grateful recognition 
of Dutch hospitality and at Delfshaven raise some 
durable token of our appreciation of both hosts and 
guests, — calling upon all Americans who honor alike 
the principles and the founders of the two republics to 
join in the enterprise. Therefore be it 

Resolved, That the Club heartily approves of the 
erection of such a commemorative monument. 



IV PREFACE 

When the conunittee appointed " to act with 
full power in conjunction with committees of other 
Congregational clubs, and of any other appropri- 
ate organizations, to obtain the necessary funds, 
and to secure the erection of such a memorial," 
began their work, they encountered an amount of 
sectional and sectarian opposition which was sur- 
prising to Americans and Christians who honor 
men of other religion, ancestry, and nationality 
than their own. There seemed to be a deter- 
mination to ignore facts in American history and 
to make of the story of New England's origins a 
panegyric only. 

The author of this book, seeing the need of a 
restatement of the facts, determined to re-visit the 
three homes of the Pilgrims and so study their 
story, and also the Dutch language, as to be free 
from the necessity of taking second-hand opinions 
and statements from any one. 

Considering historic truth as sacred as that in 
any other form, and inheriting from my English 
ancestors a love of fair play, I have tried to tell 
the story of the Pilgrims, though in very con- 
densed form ; for the limitations of the book and 
series do not allow of notes or of the citation of 
authorities. I have tried to state only the facts 



PREFACE V 

or to give expression to well-grounded inferences ; 
but knowing, from some experience as a student 
of both Oriental and Occidental history, how diffi- 
cult it is to keep out what is not and to keep in 
what is strictly true, I shall be grateful to any 
one for corrections of inaccuracies or of proved 
errors. 

The first founders of Massachusetts were not 
merely representatives of church polity. They 
were men and women of beautiful life and of 
attractive character. If they had the infirmities 
and limitations of other mortals, they also showed 
the touches of nature which make the whole world 
kin. I have tried to depict them amidst the 
hopes and fears, the joys and sorrows, of their 
daily environment in three lands. 

Besides studying critically the autograph writ- 
ings of the Pilgrim leaders, repeatedly perusing 
Bradford's " History of Plimouth Plantation," I 
have read much in English and Dutch state papers 
and statute law, the letters of Earl Leicester, Sir 
Dudley Carleton, and others prominent in politics 
during the Pilgrim period, as well as many of the 
writings of the enemies of the Separatists. I 
have made grateful use also of the published pro- 
ceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 



VI PREFACE 

the Koninglijke Akademie at the Hague, and 
the Nedei'landsche Archief voor Kerklijke Ge- 
schiedenis, the original archives of the city of 
Leyden, and the researches of the English, Dutch, 
and American specialists, Hunter, Bartlett, Scott, 
Brown, Arber, Kist, De Hoop Scheffer, Swalue, 
Young, Dexter, Murphy, Davis, and others. I 
made three leisurely visits also to the three homes 
of the Pilgrims in England, Holland, and Amer- 
ica : in 1891, 1892, and 1895. 

My thanks are especially due to those libra- 
rians in England and Netherland, whose courtesy 
I gladly acknowledge, and to the Eev. Dr. Wil- 
liam H. Cobb, of Boston, the Eev. M. G. Hansen, 
of East Orange, N. J., and William Nelson No- 
ble, Esq., of Ithaca, whose criticisms and sugges- 
tions have been of great value. 

May passing time but brighten, and added truth 
but illuminate, the inspiring Pilgrim story. 

W. E. G. 

Ithaca, N. Y., February 10, 1898. 



CONTENTS 

Chaptee ^^^^ 

I. InTKODUCTION and CoaiPABISON ... 1 

n. AUSTERFIELD AND THE PiLGRIM DISTRICT . 14 

III. SCROOBY AND ItS HiSTORY .... 26 

IV. Nottingham and the Robin Hood Country 35 
V. William Brewster 45 

VI. William Bradford ...._. 60 

VII. " Into a New World " — Amsterdam . • 72 

VIII. "A Fair and Beautiful City" — Leyden 84 

IX. Love, Courtship, and Marriage ... 97 

X. Work and Play in Leyden ... 117 

XI. Life under a Federal Government . . 133 

XII. The Debate upon Emigration . . . 149 

XIII. Westward Ho! 162 

XIV. The Compact at Cape Cod ... 177 
XV. In Their Third Home 187 

XVI. The First Families of America • . 199 

XVII. Sickness and Health, War and Diplomacy 210 

XVIII. Politics: Domestic and Foreign . . 228 

XIX. A Visit from Manhattan 

XX. Law and Punishment .... 

XXI. Food, Dress, and Social Life 

XXII. Customs and Superstitions ... 275 

XXIII. The New England Confederation . . 285 

Index 291 



242 
254 

263 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Paob 
Departttke from Dblfshaven . . . Frontispiece 

AUSTERFIELD ChUKCH DoOR 24 

ScROOBY Church and Grounds in 1890 ... 30 

The Great North Eoad in 1890 56 

"Old Hundredth" in Ainsworth's Psalm Book . 82 

A Dutch Home on Santa Glaus Morning (Dec. 6) . 122 

Sir Dudley Carleton 134 

Homes and Journeys of the Pilgrims . . . 168 

Edward Winslow 204 

Robinson's Family Record in Leyden City Census, 

1622 241 

Pilgrim Relics at Plymouth, Mass. . . . 264 

Facsimile from a Page of Bradford's Manuscript . 276 



THE 

PILGRIMS IN THEIR THREE HOMES 



CHAPTER I 

INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 

All English-speaking people ought to know 
the difference between the Pilgrims and the Puri- 
tans. The Pilgrims separated Church and State. 
They believed in the right and power of Christian 
people to govern themselves, and they believed 
this when, even in England, it was dangerous to 
breathe such an idea. They were hunted out of 
their home-land into the Dutch republic, where 
conscience was free. Thence they crossed the 
stormy ocean, and began on American soil the 
experiment of self-government. 

To-day their descendants, direct and collateral, 
may number a million. They are found in all 
the States of the Union, and among Christians of 
every name. By them the heroic Pilgrim ances- 
tors have been transfigured, their story has been 
embalmed in art and poetry, and kept alive in 
monuments and in celebrations. Descent from a 



2 INTRODUCTION AND COMPAEISON 

Pilgrim father or mother is like a patent of nobil- 
ity. New England societies, Congregational clubs 
and churches of many names, from Sandy Hook 
to the Golden Gate, from the fresh-water ocean to 
the hot salt gulf, annually recount their merits, 
and retell the old story. In all lands where the 
English tongue is sweet to the ear, their name 
is honored. Whittier, in order to make known 
the German Pastorius, who first in the region 
of the United States protested against slavery, 
has to call him " The Pennsylvania Pilgrim." 

Tens of thousands of tourists each year visit 
the old historic spots at Plymouth. The boulder 
from the far north, which in history was only a 
threshold, has become in rhetoric mountain-large, 
though as keepsake and paper-weight as small as 
a scarab. By Longfellow the poet, Hawthorne 
the romancer, Boughton the painter, historiogra- 
phers by the score, a library of books concerning 
them, great pictures in the national Capitol ro- 
tunda at Washington, and vignettes on the na- 
tional bank-notes, the Pilgrims are well advertised. 
A mighty shaft on Plymouth heights, with its ped- 
estal cuirassed with bas-reliefs, surmounted and 
flanked with sculptures, and another of lesser pro- 
portions at Provincetown overlook the sands of 
their third home. Bronze tablets at Scrooby, 
Leyden, Provincetown, and the two Plymouths 
serve to keep bright their memory. Relics of 
stone, on which their feet may have trodden, are 



INTEODUCTION AND COMPABISON 3 

built into the facades and walls of great churches. 
The two great English-speaking people thrill when 
the miscalled " Log of the Maj^ower " — the 
book of Genesis in the history of JVIassaclmsetts — 
recrosses the ocean. Their fame has gone through- 
out the world, and their glorious testimony to the 
ends of the earth. 

Their story is worth telling without fear or 
favor, in simple style for young people, as I shall 
try to tell it. 

Strange to say, their place of origin was not 
known to living men until half a century ago. 
Not only during their own lives, but long after 
they had passed away, the Pilgrims, now immortal 
in American history and in the story of human 
progress, were like the " poor wayfaring man of 
grief," so far as their king or country cared. 
When they left England, nobody recked whither 
they went. In Holland few inquired whence 
they came. James Stuart, their " dread sover- 
eign," was only sorry that he could not lay violent 
hands on them while in their Dutch asylum. They 
were plucked, like fowls for the spit, by the Mer- 
chant Adventurers. Besides utterly neglecting 
Dutch history, few Americans, except John 
Adams, took the trouble to visit their old home 
in Leyden. Until near the year 1850, their de- 
scendants, and our own and the English nation, 
could not place the Pilgrims' cradle-land. 

This was finally discovered to be just where 



4 INTRODUCTION AND COMP^LRISON 

William Bradford, their historian, who wrote the 
first book of American history, said it was. Brad- 
ford's work, dubbed by the English newspapers 
" The Log of the Mayflower," but by the author 
entitled the " History of Plimouth Plantation," is 
the written volume which our English friends in 
1897 restored to us. It was the property of the 
Old South Church of Boston, from whose library 
it had been taken in Revolutionary days. Our 
first ambassador to Great Britain, Thomas Fran- 
cis Bayard, brought it across the sea, and on 
Wednesday, the twenty-seventh of May, 1897, it 
was delivered to the State of Massachusetts, in 
the archives of which it now rests. 

Bradford, writing between the years 1640 and 
1650, says that these people of three homes and 
two continents were originally " of several towns 
and villages, some in Nottinghamshire, some in 
Lincolnshire, and some in Yorkshire, where they 
bordered nearest together." Yet although this 
statement was copied by Prince in his annals, and 
though Cotton Mather, in a sketch of Bradford's 
life, writes that he was born at Ansterfield, thei-e 
was a riddle which for over two centuries stood 
like a sphinx in American literature. The puz- 
zle was not solved till an American and an Eng- 
lishman put their heads together, and penetrated 
the mystery. 

That little misprinted letter 7i was as the sym- 
bol X in algebra, — an unknown quantity which 



INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 6 

baffled those who tried to solve the problem. No 
such place could be found in all England, ancient 
or modern. Instead of an n it ought to have been 
a u. When Mr. James Savage, of Massachusetts, 
the genealogist, in 1842 visited the Rev. John 
Hunter, a native and an historian of Yorkshire, 
this Enolish gentleman discovered Austerfield 
and the baptismal record of William Bradford. 
In 1849, in a little book, he told what he had 
found out about the " Founders of New Plym- 
mouth." 

Even before this, however, the Ley den profes- 
sor, N. C. Kist, and the Mennonite scholar. Dr. 
J. G. D. Scheffer, of Amsterdam, who had read 
the Dutch records of two cities, discovered much 
of delightful interest ; for Holland is rich in Pil- 
grim memories. After these have come a host of 
wise men from both west and east of the Atlan- 
tic, who have searched diligently to find where 
the young Pilgrim republic was born. Every year 
the twilight becomes more like day and mysteries 
vanish. The hidden church now shines forth. 
The story is luminous and nearly complete. New 
links of interest bind us as Americans to the 
mother-country of England and the fatherland 
of Holland. " History is a resurrection." 

To understand why these North Country folk 
left " Merrie England," we must ride backward on 
the winged wheel of imagination to the opening 
of the sixteenth century. Three hundred years 



6 INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 

ago everything, except human nature and the 
ocean and sky, was quite different from what we 
see in our time. Di-ess and food, manners and 
customs, politics and religion, houses and the way 
of living, farming and crops, the relations of land 
and water, and the outlook of people on the great 
world and the countries beyond, were not as now. 
Think of living, even in cities, where there were 
no newspapers, railways, telegraphs, telephones, 
photographs, matches, fire engines, water pipes, 
tinware, china dishes, tea or coffee. Fancy vil- 
lages where brick houses and iron ploughs, under- 
clothing and starch, — " the Devil's liquid," as 
the Puritan Stubbes called it, — were just begin- 
ning to come into fashion, and where these novel- 
ties from the continent were hardly more than 
curiosities. 

Then paved roads, fenced or hedged fields, post- 
offices, postage stamps, and letters carried by 
government for the people were unknown. Then 
England was a weak and sparsely populated coun- 
try of about four million people. In large por- 
tions of it, and even where is now good farm-land, 
were great areas of swamp, heath, and forest. 
Most of the eastern counties consisted of reedy 
marshes, above which uncounted wild fowl wheeled 
in the air, while only here and there were patches 
of ploughed land. Then the seven states of the 
Dutch rejiublic had only eight hundred thousand 
inhabitants. All of what is now the United States 



INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 7 

of America was but a savage wilderness inhabited 
by possibly a third of a million of Indians, and a 
few hundred Spaniards in New Mexico and Flor- 
ida. How strange it must have been to live in 
those times, and how hard to imagine now how 
people got along then ! 

Fortunately for the present writer, this is not 
so very difficult a thing for him to do. I can 
hold up a mirror and draw from experience. 
Even in this nineteenth century, I lived during 
four years in an island empire much like Great 
Britain. During one whole year, while in a city 
of forty thousand people, rich in castle towers, 
drawbridges, moats, guilds, and things mediaeval 
and feudalistic, I saw no newspaper, milk wagon, 
telegraph, telephone, railway, horse carriage or 
wagon, gas lamp, iron or terra cotta water pipe, sta- 
tionary washstand, or house furnished with water, 
other than from wells. There were very few of 
the modern things or ideas. The condition of 
society, state, and church was like that of six- 
teenth-century Europe. There were castles and 
cathedrals, abbots and armed men. All gentle- 
men wore swords. The land was not owned by 
those who worked it, but was rented, through many 
grades of rank, from the sovereign to lords tem- 
j)oral and spiritual. Except the yeomen, or frank- 
lins, who were freeholders, the agricultural labor- 
ers were not much better than serfs. 

The king was hedged about with divinity, and 



8 INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 

supposed to get all liis power direct from Heaven. 
When he appeared in public, common folks fell 
down on their knees. Religion was a matter of 
the state, governed by the court and the politi- 
cians. People who did not agree with the state 
church were persecuted, thrown into prison, or put 
to death. Yet, paradoxical as it may seem, these 
nineteenth-century heretics, or separatists, were 
not allowed to leave the country. Exactly as 
in sixteenth-century England, a large part of the 
best land was owned by the monasteries, which 
like the monks and nuns were very numerous, a 
great ecclesiastical corporation controlled human 
life from the cradle to the grave, and the " tor- 
tures of hell were graded according to the money " 
paid the priests in temple, monastery, or chantry, 
who had charge of masses. The priests had sharp 
eyes upon the deathbed of the wealthy. These 
who would not give or will much property to the 
religious corporations were pretty sure to be 
damned. 

In this country, in which I dwelt nearly four 
years, torture was used in the courts, just as in 
Europe, and even in England, until the reign of 
William III. In law and science the people were 
no better off than in I'eligion. Strange and curi- 
ous superstitions fettered the minds of both learned 
and unlearned in matters of building, crops, the 
weather, and household and social life, just as in 
the old Europe where our pagan and our Chris- 



INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 9 

tian forefathers lived. Here, also, were witch- 
craft, sorcery, plague, pestilence, and famine, be- 
sides pretty material for legend and fairy tale. 
Outwardly the different classes of people were 
marked by their dress. The bishops, as well as 
the nobles, abbots, and priests, wore peculiar uni- 
forms. Nobles of church or state had many idle 
followers, retainers, and servants, who were attired 
in their masters' livery. Parades and shows made 
fine sights for the people, who were fleeced by 
these gayly dressed fellows ; for king, princes, 
earls, dukes, marquises, barons, and all degrees 
of nobility and gentry lived off " the commons," 
among whom were yeomen, farmers, mechanics, 
and others little better than slaves. There were 
craftsmen's guilds and trade monopolies, just as in 
old Europe. The merchant was Socially of small 
account. The noblemen, priests, and gentlemen 
made society. The tenant farmer was respected, 
but was ground down to support those above him. 
People in each grade of society dressing in a dif- 
ferent way, there was a great variety of costume. 
Matters of clothes and etiquette, splendor and 
show, old customs and festivities, were of vast 
importance. There was nothing of what we call 
underclothing, though there was plenty of silk 
and gay equipment, but the majority of the people 
lived very plainly as to dress and food. There 
were no brick houses. Ploughs and other farm 
tools were of a very rude sort. 



10 INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 

When the reformation came, which has made 
a new nation of these island dwellers, and the 
revenues of the monasteries were confiscated, 
there were insurrections of the rudely armed peo- 
ple led by reactionary and impoverished nobles, 
gentlemen and priests, wonderfully like the " Pil- 
grimage of Grace " and the " Uprising in the 
North," as in old England of the sixteenth cen- 
tury. The description of one country will do for 
the other. 

In a word, this country in which I lived was 
surprisingly like sixteenth-century England at a 
thousand points, whether we look at the landscape, 
which had few or no fences or hedges, but plenty 
of feudal castles, monasteries, and nunneries, or 
at the oddly dressed characters going up and down 
the horse tracks and f ooti)aths, — for there were 
few roads, in the modern sense of the term. All 
around were shrines and objects of religion and 
superstition, with jDlenty of beggars, lepers, and 
miserably poor folk. Instead of post-offices, there 
were, besides inns for meals and beds, relays, 
where people in government employ could secure 
horses or burden bearers, exactly as on the great 
North Road between London and Edinburgh. 

Curiously enough also, these times, during which 
I lived at the capital of a baron, among his retain- 
ers and under the shadow of his castle near a 
monastery, were jjolitically just like the times of 
Queen Elizabeth. In the matter of social changes, 



INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 11 

economic progress, the introduction of foreign 
notions and machines and people to work them, 
and of the transformation of the whole nation 
from an agricultural to a commercial and manu- 
facturing people, the country of my sojourn was 
just like Elizabethan England. A closer union 
was being formed between the throne and the 
people. The court peers, landed nobles, and 
lords spiritual were becoming of less importance. 
The merchants were rising in social dignity. The 
old life was everywhere being modified because 
of foreign ideals, customs, and importations. The 
simple industries carried on in dwelling-houses 
were changing to multiplied and varied activities. 
The weavers, potters, and mechanics, instead of 
having looms, wheels, and anvils in their own 
houses, were being assembled into factories. Life 
from 1870 to 1874 in this island empire, at one 
end of the earth's greatest land division, appeared, 
as in a theatre, to be the reproduction on a stage of 
the life on that island empire at the other end, at 
a time when the founders of Massachusetts were 
boys and girls in England. Old Japan illustrated 
Old England, and New Japan, New England. 
Race and color of skin and form of religion 
might be different, but human nature was the 
same. 

Note also two strange coincidences. Just when 
the Pilgrim fathers and mothers in the May- 
flower were leaving their old home-land, which 



12 INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 

had been shut against them, to open a new world, 
the ancient empire was expelling the Jesuits, wel- 
coming the Dutch at Deshima, and barring its 
gates against all other foreigners. 

Over two centuries later, in 1848, exactly when 
Mr. Hunter was discovering the Pilgrims' home 
and Bradford's baptismal record, the shipwrecked 
American sailor, Ronald McDonald, from Sag 
Harbor, New York, became the first teacher of the 
English language in the sealed empire, and thus 
the real founder of her new national education. 
The whaling ship which carried him to Japan was 
named Plymouth. When the star of Perry's 
broad pennant was mirrored in the clear waters of 
Yedo Bay, his oldest ship bore the same name, 
Plymouth. When Japanese offtcers asked pri- 
vate sailor and plenipotentiai-y commodore the 
supreme source of authority in the United States, 
both answered " The people." 

The Pilgrim faith had but deepened and ex- 
panded. 

Come then, fellow Americans and speakers of 
the English tongue, subjects of King Shakespeare 
and inheritors of the Pilgrim idea of government, 
and let us visit England at about the latitude, 
though not in the climate of Labrador, between 
the fifty-third and fifty-fourth degrees, where Not- 
tinghamshire and Lincolnshire adjoin. We shall 
stand upon Gringiey-on-the-Hill, over which the 
lad Will Bradford used to walk in going to church 



INTRODUCTION AND COMPARISON 13 

at Gainsborough, and from which the view is fine 
and far. We select him as our typical Pilgrim. 
His life comprehends the whole of the poetic and 
heroic period of the Pilgrim story. After him, 
we name Brewster. For convenience, to avoid 
circumlocutions and to save space, I shall at once 
and throughout this book speak of the company 
led by Brewster, Robinson, and Bradford as " The 
Pilgrims." 

Of my four visits to Scrooby, the home of 
Brewster, the first was made with a great com- 
pany. It was in 1891, when to the International 
Council in London it seemed as if " dear mother 
England " were calling back her outcast children. 
Pew Englishmen had then visited the place, or 
knew where it was. On " Bank Holiday " in 
1892, desiring a second leisurely sight of the Pil- 
grim cradle-land, I started from Lincoln. I asked 
at this station, which is on a great railway and 
within thirty miles of the village, for a ticket to 
Scrooby. The agent knew not the name of the 
place. He compelled me to repronounce and spell 
the word, but was still incredulous as to the exist- 
ence of such a station. So I " booked " for Baw- 
try, and then walked up to Scrooby. The hamlet 
is now visited annually by scores, perhaps hun- 
dreds of Americans. Worksop, the home of my 
Eyre ancestors, is a few miles to the southwest. 



CHAPTER II 

AUSTERFIELD AND THE PILGRIM DISTRICT 

Many things have changed in our fathers' old 
home — dear and mighty England — since the 
flight of the Pilgrims from Scrooby. Even the 
very memory of their exodus to Holland died out 
long ago from this region. Yet the landscape is 
much the same, though that too has changed in 
respect of surface water, which is far less than 
then. On all the sloj)e from the central hills of 
the island toward the North Sea and the Wash, 
the ground was once very wet and swampy, and 
much more liable to overflow from the Humber, 
the Ouse, and the Trent rivers, than it is now. 
Indeed, the whole line of eastern counties from 
Essex to York formed a great fen region, full of 
standing as well as of flowing water, with only 
here and there hard ground which served as roads, 
sites for towns, and soil for cultivation. Ely got 
its name because it was an cely place, and the 
telltale terminations of many places ending in 
" wick," " beach," " holme," " beck," and " hoe," 
suggesting low places near or on water, show what 
they were formerly. 

Names ending in "ford" and "bridge," in- 



AUSTEEFIELD 15 

dicating that tliere had to be some way for get- 
ting* across the water, are plentiful. For the 
traveler, there was always "one more river to 
cross.". John Bunyan, in his " Pilgrim's Pro- 
gress," Defoe, in his " Tour through the Eastern 
Counties," Jean Ingelow, in her " High Tide on 
the Coast of Lincolnshire," and Charles Kingsley, 
in his classic paper on " The Fens," have made 
wonderful word-pictures of this sunken land. Not 
a few old churches in this region were once built 
on islands, and approached by causeways. To 
this day, as one alights from Scrooby railway 
station, he notices, first of all, drains and cul- 
verts. As he walks to the village, past the old 
manor fields on the right, his pathway is upon 
timber raised above the oft-flooded road. 

Since the great drainage operations in the form 
of canals, causeways, and dykes, made chiefly by 
the Dutch engineers in the seventeenth and eigh- 
teenth century, the whole face of the country has 
changed. The area of fertile soil having vastly 
increased, population has doubled, tripled, and 
quadrupled. Land once under water and given 
to breeding malarial diseases now smiles with 
grain and gardens, and is rich in cattle and men. 
Where two rabbits used to fight for one blade of 
grass, there are now a hundred stalks. John 
Wesley in 1703 opened his eyes on the island 
formed by three rivers, Trent, Idle, and Don, 
which in Pilgrim days was a pestilential marsh. 



16 AUSTERFIELD 

Vermuyden and his Dutchmen had drained It, 
making of it rich and dry soil. On Axelhohne, 
once the swamp island, sprang up Epworth. To 
this day the Dutch accent and blood are notice- 
able in Lincolnshire. No region is more inter- 
esting to Americans than these eastern counties. 

Study the names of places, and this part of 
England fronting Denmark and Friesland will 
tell stories as fascinating as fairy tales. Here 
has been the great battlefield of invading Briton, 
Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Frisian, and Dane. On 
every squai'e mile they have fought, camped, or 
settled, made beacons on its hills, cut paths, and 
built roads. We recognize the names which each 
nation left behind it, and often as easily and as 
clearly as we tell the difference between the hoof- 
mark of a horse, the paw-print of a dog, and the 
track of a pigeon's pink toes. The Keltic " pen " 
and " combe " and " ock " appear and reappear. 
Count up the Roman's " castra " or camps, as in 
Doncaster, and note his " colonia," as in Lincoln. 
These and other Latin words have suffered a 
slight change of form. Of Anglo-Saxon names 
there is an abundance, as in " ham," which means 
home, such as Rotherham ; in " field," such as 
Sheffield and Austerfield ; and In " try," the name 
of a town, such as Coventry and Bawtry. After 
Frisians and Anglo-Saxons came the Danes, whose 
town names ended in " by " and " ing," as we see 
in Scrooby and Reading. 



AUSTERFIELD 17 

These Danes or Norsemen, our ancestors, were 
famous old pagans. Like the rest of their Scan- 
dinavian brethren, they remained " heathen " after 
the Frisians and Anglo-Saxons, both on the con- 
tinent and in England, had become Christian. 
They worshiped Woden and Thor, whose names 
we preserve in Wednesday and Thursday. Woden 
was the god that knew everything, because two 
ravens, wisest of birds, flew out into all the world 
during the day, and came back at night to perch 
on his shoulder, and whisper in his ear, telling 
him everything. These ravens, Munin and Hugin, 
perception and reflection, helped to make Woden 
omniscient. When the Norsemen went out on 
the deep sea without chart or compass, they not 
only worshiped Woden, but honored the raven as 
his wise servant, using the bird at sea as a pilot, 
and on land as an indicator of the god's will. 
Very probably from this Norse mythology, Edgar 
A. Poe borrowed the idea of his talking bird, the 
raven of dark memory with its accusing " Never- 
more." 

The Danes were more than pirates. They were 
bold navigators, discoverers, and colonizers. Com- 
ing vip the Humber and Trent rivers, they made 
this part of England especially theirs. They di- 
vided the country into " ridings," and enjoyed local 
government. Gainsborough is probably the j^lace 
where Canute's followers wanted him to turn back 
the waters of the sea. Wherever the Danes got 



18 AUSTEEFIELD 

a foothold in England, there and only there do 
we find names of places ending in "by" and 
"ing," while other settlements of theirs have 
" raven " or " ran " in their names, such as Rans- 
kill, the hamlet next to Scrooby ; that is, the 
raven's knoll, or hill. It is not merely an acci- 
dent that over the Austerfield chui'ch door are 
carved a dragon, the lightning zigzag of Thor, and 
the raven's beak of Woden's servants, conven- 
tional in form though they be. 

These Norsemen, who were kinsmen of the later 
and more civilized Normans, not only robbed, 
burned, and killed, like our Saxon forefathers 
before them, but they loved to go into Christian 
churches to defile and burn them. But woe to 
them when they were caught ! They were flayed 
alive, and their skins were fixed to the church 
doors. In more peaceful centuries bits of human 
skin found under the old nail-heads of oaken 
church doors have been deposited in the British 
Museum. 

It is well to pay attention to these names, be- 
cause like bones, nerves, and organs, whether of a 
man or a monkey, of a geological horse with toes 
or a modern horse with hoofs, as well as the fea- 
tures of plants and vegetables, they reveal early 
history, through heredity and evolution, far better 
than any later traditions or writings or ortho- 
doxies possibly can do. They are original docu- 
ments, which we can interpret without prejudice 



AUSTEEFIELB 19 

or heresy. To understand what kind of men and 
women lived in the Pilgrim district we must study 
their composite ancestry, the physiognomy of the 
country, and know the sixperstitions and beliefs 
of the people who lived on the soil. Neither 
Calvinism nor Puritanism nor Anglicanism can 
bleach out the stains of the primitive paganism of 
our Teutonic fathers. Just as the Spaniards 
chased the shadows of ancient myths in Florida 
and Mexico, so into North America Pilgrim and 
Puritan brought the legends and superstitions of 
northern Europe. 

What we call the Pilgrim district is in the 
very heart of the Danish region. It lies chiefly 
along the steel tracks of the Great Northern 
Railway over which the lightning train called 
the " Flying Scotchman " whizzes on its way be- 
tween London and Edinburgh. As on the 
silk threads of a double rosary, we can string 
most of the towns famous in Pilgrim story, either 
on this railway, or on the North Road, which, 
from Newark to Bawtry, at the end of Notting- 
ham, is close to it. In Roman days the legions 
tramped towards the North Star, and the mer- 
chants transported their goods, over ground much 
the same, called the Fosse Way, or Ermine 
Street. In Elizabethan England, so soon as one 
got beyond the cities and towns, there were, 
roughly speaking, nothing better than unfenced 
paths. The highway to Scotland was little else 



20 AUSTERFIELD 

than a horse track, though we shall find that it 
is the main geographical thread of our story. 
This horse track but a few feet wide, on which 
kings, nobles, and armies traveled, was called the 
Great Northern Road. It was the artery by 
which the people in this quiet agricultural region 
were connected with the mighty world beyond, 
through which they felt the throbs of England's 
life and the pulses of the continent. 

The Pilgrim country is plain, and the scenery, 
though pretty, is not bold, striking, or romantic. 
It is mostly lowland, in the valleys formed by the 
Ryton and the Idle, — little rivers whose united 
flood helps to swell the Trent. Each of these 
three streams takes its source on the westward 
slopes of the famous Sherwood Forest. The Pil- 
grim district lies mostly in the valley of the 
southern Trent, which further north unites with 
the Ouse to form the river Humber. It was 
never very thickly populated, nor is it now, for 
its soil is not particularly fertile. Bawtry, the 
town lying between Austerfield and Scrooby, is 
one hundred and fifty-three miles north of Lon- 
don. 

The Idle, which forms part of the boundary 
line between York and Notts, is usually a rush- 
ing stream and not at all lazy. Its name means 
" flowing through grain fields." The upper limit 
of the Pilgrim district is Austerfield. Take 
for its lower limit East Retford on the I'ight, 



AUSTEBFIELD 21 

with Worksop (the home of the writer's an- 
cestors) on the left, and we have a triangle, 
whose sides are, roughly, eleven, seven, and nine 
miles long. York, where the archbishop lived, 
was forty-six miles northward. Southward, Not- 
tingham is thirty-five miles, and Newark upon 
Trent (where the writer's ancestor. Sir Gervaise 
Eyre, in command of the castle of King Charles 
I., was slain in the civil war), about twenty-five 
miles distant. Eastward, Gainsborough is twelve 
miles, Lincoln thirty-one miles, and Boston sixty- 
seven miles away. 

The traveler must remember that the roads, as 
they now appear, are of modern construction. 
Such a thing as a wheeled wagon was quite un- 
common in the early years of Henry VIII. Plea- 
sure carriages were not seen until introduced 
from the continent. When the first one was 
driven abroad in London, people thought it was 
some Oriental shrine or curiosity. In all pic- 
tures and prints of the time, we see lords and 
ladies riding on horseback, but never in a car- 
riage. " Palfrey," meaning an extra post-horse, 
was the common term for the animal carrying a 
lady. Fond of jewelry as they were in the age of 
Elizabeth, when the gold and spices and silks 
of the East and the wonderful things from Amer- 
ica were getting to be well known in England, it 
was not uncommon to see " a lady on horseback " 
with peaked headdress, very long veil, skirts 



22 AUSTERFIELD 

sweeping to the rear and upheld by pages, or 
even with " rings on her fingers and bells on her 
toes." Mother Goose's Melodies contain some 
very clear and very wonderful pictures of the 
England of long ago. 

Scrooby and Austerfield, though small and 
mean places, were not the least among the north- 
ern villages. Near Austerfield is an old Roman 
earthwork linked with the name of the imperial 
general Ostorius, though the name (spelled 
Ousterfield in the Domesday book and Auster- 
field in early Yankee printing) is most probably 
Teutonic for Easternfield. 

Anglo-Saxon Austerfield had a little church in 
which a great question was settled for all Britain 
by a synod held in the year 702. A great con- 
troversy had arisen about the celebration of 
Easter. One party favored the British and the 
other the Roman date. Wilfrid, the handsome 
and eloquent Bishop of York, made a journey to 
Rome to find what the Pope thought. He was 
shipwrecked on the coast of Friesland, but the 
language on both sides of the North Sea being 
the same, he preached the gospel and introduced 
Christianity into the Netherlands. After seeing 
Rome, he returned to England and became a hot 
partisan of the southern style and time. He 
built many churches in England, but was always 
on the Roman side, taking his politics, as well as 
his dogmas, from the Tiber. He quarreled with 



AUSTEBFIELD 23 

King Egfrid and his qneen of Northumbria, who 
deposed him from the bishopric. Pie once more 
went to Rome and appealed to the Pope, who 
decided in his favor : but when he returned to 
England, the Saxon king snapped his fingers at 
the Italian bishop's decision, and imprisoned 
Wilfrid. He, however, escaped to Sussex, and 
there was successful as a missionary preacher. 
He still hoped to get back the bishopric of 
York, but even after Egfrid's death this king's 
father, Aldfrid, refused to reinstate the now aged 
prelate. 

At the great synod which met at Austerfield 
in 702, King Aldfrid, the Archbishop Berthwald 
of Canterbury, and the bishoijs of almost all 
Briton assembled in this most central spot to 
hear the complaint of Wilfrid. Despite the 
pleadings of Wilfrid's brother, Archbishop of 
Canterbury, on his behalf, the king was sustained 
in his action. The synod of Austerfield excom- 
municated Wilfrid and his companions. So 
thoroughly was this work done that if any of the 
abbots or priests of Wilfrid's pai*ty said grace be- 
fore meat in a man's house and signed the food 
with the sign of the cross, it was ordered to be 
cast forth as though offered to idols. 

The pith and meaning of this ancient Auster- 
field matter is that in England the party backed 
by the Pope was beaten and the spirit of inde- 
pendence prevailed. The English won the day, 



24 AUSTEBFIELD 

prof erring to Ti^:ii]ate Ihteir rdigioB in fkeir own 
war. The twelve hnndieddi annivasarr of this 
famous synod of AiistH'6eld, whieh deposed Saint 
Wafrid,'win oecor in 1902. 

XeTerthekss. Wilfrid got back his see hefove 
he died, and after his death tiiK tvie&deposed 
bish(^ and standb upholder o£ Bonish * m&Ij « > m s 
^ras canoniapd as a saint, vhile the rhwi f h of 
Seioobv. built of stone, was naoMd after him. 
It is Saint Wilfrid's ehordi in ^diidi die PJlyrim^i 
first worshiped and whieh we see to-dar. 

In die Xooman aa, a£b» the year 1088, 
Thomas of Bayeox became Ait^bishi^ oi Yotk. 
In erasading times^ the lady Id<Mea de Yipoat 
or her father, Jojm de Bosli. gave the v^ole 
Tillage of Aosterfield for the siq^KMt fd a chap- 
lain to pray, and to celebrate, in the house aft Lob- 
doou masses for the sool of fiobert de VquML 
In die reign of Henry IL this John de BosG <» 
Boilli (1154-1189) boik die new ehapd at Ai^ 
terfield, attadiing it, as wi^ as tiie cha^d aft 
Bawtry. to the convent at Blyth. Tlie edifice mas 
thus originally a *• ehantry-.~ ei«eted for tiie bene- 
fit of a '^ sool in purgatory.*^ It is still standi^ 
and is called the Chaqpel of St. Helen. It was in 
this litde boose <^ wiwship. with its qioaint post 
and double aurdied entrance carn^ widi die 
Norsemen's symbcds of die Iightning''s i%zag, 
raven's beak ornament, and a rode son of dragon 
soeh as Saint G^>rge maT havv slain, thai WH- 






B^^I^^H m:^^ 


£i I 


_^^^^^^^^^^^^H *^ " ^1 It ft 


' -^^^^^U 









JKr~3S39^Qai 'CBftTnH 



AUSTERFIELD 25 

liam Bradford was baptized March 19, 1590. 
Within the building some alterations, including 
new pews, have been made, but the outside of it 
was much the same as in Pilgrim days, until 
1897, when a process of restoration began. 



CHAPTER III 

SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 

ScROOBY was originally a Danish settlement, 
and had a close relationship with York, that 
wonderful place of Roman, Anglo-Saxon, Nor- 
man, and English fame. York is one of the 
most ancient of British cities, and was renowned 
for Jewish wealth as well as for clerical ambition. 
It had been the reputed birthplace of one 
Roman emperor, Constantino, the dwelling-place 
of another, Hadrian, and here Severus died. It 
was the seat of the first English parliament, and 
in this august body the abbot of the York monas- 
tery had a seat and wore a mitre. Though the 
archbishop dwelt in magnificence at York, he 
moved from place to place while attending to 
political and religious matters. At Scrooby was 
one of his summer palaces, hunting lodges, or 
places of abode, where he could also give lodging 
to his retainers. 

In comparison with the cottages around it, the 
episcopal residence at Scrooby was a palace. Be- 
cause it stood on a manor or estate owned by the 
prelate, it was alsp called a manor house, and 
in it on the 12th of January, 1535, there were 



SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 27 

thirty-nine chambers or apartments. According 
to an inventory there were in the great hall three 
screens, six tables, nine benches, and one cup- 
board. The furniture of the chapel consisted of 
a timber altar and two superaltars, or stone tops, 
to lay upon the wood, a reading-desk, a pair of 
organs, and a clock, possibly from Freiburg, but 
out of repair, lacking weights and cords. Shake- 
speare, in " Love's Labour 's Lost," makes Biron 
poke fun at the German clocks, " still a repair- 
ing ; ever out of frame." 

Probably the handsomest of all the apartments 
was the refectory, or dining-room, which was 
lined on ceiling and walls with carved oak panels 
and beams. The dining-chamber was " ceiled 
and dressed with ' wainscot,' " — which is an old 
Dutch word for the finest oak without knots or 
flaws. Many of these oaken beams are now to 
be found in the roof supports of the cow-houses 
and stables on the old site. As with most old 
castles and manors in those days, there was a 
moat or ditch around the four-sided inclosure, 
which was crossed by a drawbridge. The gate 
was on the east side. There were three fish-ponds, 
in which " Friday food " was kept swimming ; 
for no meat was eaten on the day named after 
the old goddess Freyja, and on which Christ is 
believed to have been crucified. 

Old John Leland, librarian and chaplain to 
Henry VIII., tells us about Scrooby of Tudor 



28 SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 

days. He received the king's commission to ex- 
plore the cathedrals, colleges, abbeys and priories, 
and antiquities of his realm. He made a journey 
on horseback from Gainsborough westward over 
the Trent River into Nottinghamshire to the 
village of Mattersey. " Thence I rode a mile, 
in low wash and somewhat fenny ground ; and 
a mile further or more by higher ground, to 
Scrooby." Besides the church, he " noted a 
great Manor Place ... all builded of timber ; 
saving the front of the hall, that is of brick, to 
which one ascends over cut-stone steps." After 
this, he forded the unbridged Ryton River, " and 
so betwixt the pales of two parks belonging to 
Scrooby," he came to Bawtry. 

On this we may remark that probably the only 
bricks in the village were ujiou the Hall front. 
The rest of the edifice was of wood. The people's 
houses were of wattle, timber, and cement. Prob- 
ably the only palings or fences were those of 
parks, belonging to rich landowners, who were 
at this time greedily encroaching upon the old 
common lands of the villages and taking away . 
from the people what belonged to the public and 
not to the lords. In the latter part of the six- 
teenth century things were going hard with the 
common people, especially with the agricultural 
workers. Phillip Stubbes, in 1583, complained 
bitterly of these landlords who were getting rich, 
not by stealing a goose from off the common, but 



SCIIOOBY AND ITS HISTOBY 29 

by stealing the whole common from under the 
goose. In the six northern counties most of the 
land in the form of great estates was held by six 
families, and the farmers had an increasingly 
hard time, which made Pilgrim emigration more 
easy than it would have been if all had been 
well. 

The church at Scrooby is named after the 
great Saint Wilfrid, so famous in England, Hol- 
land, and Rome, who was deposed, as we have 
seen, by the synod at Austerfield. It is built of 
cut square stones in what is called the early Eng- 
lish and decorated style, with the crenelated 
walls risino- above the edge of the roof. It has an 
eight-sided spire and four pinnacles, the five to- 
gether representing the wounds of Christ. There 
are heads sculptured at the ends of the window 
mullions. On the east side of the church there 
seems to be what was once a leper window. 
Within, there is an aisle on the south side, but 
none to correspond with it on the north. Of the 
bells in the tower, one is of recent casting, and 
one was put there in 1647, but the other two 
bear the dates 1411 and 1511. 

The tower, which has been twice struck by 
lightning during this century, is now equipped 
with a lightning rod such as Benjamin Franklin 
invented. The old oaken pews, which were 
carved in patterns representing vines, leaves, and 
grapes, lasted until about 1862. When the 



30 SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 

church was restored, and American lamps lighted 
with petroleum were put in, the old pews were 
sold for firewood, much to the grief of descend- 
ants of the Pilgrims who later tried to get the 
timber for souvenir material. Nevertheless, my 
friend Charles Carleton Coffin, of Boston, in 1890 
secured from the parish clerk in the vicarage the 
old oaken box-desk, on which so long and so often 
lay the church register of baptism, marriage, and 
burial. It is carved in the same style of rude 
zigzag-and-beak carving, in Norman taste, which 
adorns the church porch at Austerfield. The 
desk is possibly as old as Saint Wilfrid's church 
itself. 

In the churchyard there seems to be no tomb- 
stone older than 1620, and the parish registry 
does not go back even so far. Among the monu- 
ments in this God's acre is one to the memory of 
Archbishop Sandys' daughter. The arrange- 
ment of the tombs as we see them to-day has 
more respect to regularity of lines than to history 
or the bones beneath. To the northeast is the 
cottage known as the vicarage, where the parish 
clerk has for many generations lived. It is very 
plain, and inside there is a ladder by which one 
ascends to the upper floor. 

Near by is the village pinfold, and within a 
few feet stood until lately the stocks, — one of 
the old-time institutions of every English village, 
the pound being intended for four-footed, and the 



SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 31 

stocks for two-footed transgressors of tlie law. 
Like the okl font in which the young Pilgrims 
were baptized, the timber of the stocks was long 
since bought by Americans (for five pounds ster- 
ling). There is nothing now to be seen but the 
site whereon these stood. 

I have visited Scrooby and the surrounding 
country four times, studying by day 'and night 
life in this little village, which has changed but 
slightly in three hundred years. There are two 
public houses, the " George and the Dragon," 
and " The Saracen's Head," where one can get 
refreshment for man and horse, but no lodging 
over night. On the morning of August 1, 1895, 
it was like seeing Gray's " Elegy " acted out be- 
fore my eyes, as " the lowing herds wound slowly 
o'er the lea," after the " cock's shrill clarion " 
had been heard. In the fields the sheaves of cut 
grain were standing ready for the fork and wain, 
to be loaded and hauled into the barns. The 
birds were numerous and lively ; so also were 
the August flies and the whirring beetles. In 
the grain fields I noticed that the plan was first 
to drive the mowing-machine along the outward 
edges, gradually approaching the centre. This, 
I found, was in order to force the rabbits into 
the last clump, where they could easily be killed 
and thus made ready for pie. 

Where stood the old manor house is now a 
pasture, which by its lumpy and irregular sur- 



32 SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 

face shows to the eye skilled in studying old 
historic sites the lines of foundations long- since 
hidden by overgrowing grass. Three circles, the 
sites of former fish-ponds, can be discerned. The 
moat has in some parts been entirely filled up 
and in others nearly so, while in no place is there 
more than a few feet of water. Horses and cows 
were grazing down in these ancient feudal boun- 
daries and over the ridgy meadow. 

All that is left of the ancient edifice is a por- 
tion of the modern house in which dwelt the 
postmaster of the village, Mr. David Shillito, 
who kept a record of American visitors and 
chatted freely of old times. He died at the age 
of seventy-six in 1896. The farm is held by a 
long lease from the Archbishop of York. This 
plain brick house, mostly of modern material and 
structure, has in one wall a lofty and round- 
headed arch, which is now filled in and may once 
have formed a coach-gate or carriage entrance to 
the manor house. On this house is now a 
bronze tablet affixed by grateful Americans. 
Going out into the stables and cow-houses, built 
of brick and holding up roofs of red tile, I saw 
many stout beams of carved oak. These, though 
dusty and cobwebbed, show that they were once 
used for a nobler purpose. 

It is under a piece of one of these carved 
beams that I am writing this story of " The Pil- 
grims in their Three Homes." In the Massa- 



SCEOOBY AND ITS HISTORY 33 

chusetts house at the World's Fair in Chicago, 
in 1898, this piece of English oak, cased in Ameri- 
can glass and wood and duly inscribed, formed 
the starting-point for a tour of the various rooms 
which, in their furnishing and relics, showed the 
history of the old Bay State. Had it a tongue, 
it might be more definitely eloquent, and tell of 
many wonderful things which it had seen of 
Cardinal Wolsey and the archbishops. It might 
whisper how it had heard the prayers, the laugh- 
ter, and the jests of gay lords and their retainers. 
It might also reecho fervent petitions, heart- 
stirring sermons, and possibly the songs of the 
Pilgrim fathers, mothers, and children. 

Scrooby, like an oft-touched bead slipped on 
the rosary of England's great northern high-road, 
has many precious associations. 

It belonged to the Archbishops of York even 
when the Domesday book was written. Then 
" Scroobye " was only a " berrie " (bury), or 
hamlet, and William de Melton had " free war- 
ren " here. There must have been a lodge or 
building of some kind in the townlet in 1178, 
when John, the constable of Chester, granted to 
Roger, Archbishop of York, the town of Plumtree. 
Later on William Whorwood claimed twenty 
tofts, ten dovecotes, and twenty gardens here. 
In 1537 a successor in the line of York prelates 
demised to his brother, Geoffrey Lee, Plumtree 
Field, which was surrounded by palings, " besides 



84 SCROOBY AND ITS HISTORY 

Scrooby Park, with tlie lodge upon tlie same, to- 
gether with all his warren and game conies in the 
parishes of Scrooby and Haworth for forty-one 
years." 

A word about warrens. From the most an- 
cient times down to these years of grace, the 
English folk have always enjoyed hunting and 
eating the conies or rabbit-s as mentioned in the 
bequest. By the law of 1539 it was felony " to 
take in the king's ground any egg or bird . . . 
or to kill any conies or rabbits ... or to enter 
... to kill and steal any conies." 

It was at Scrooby that Archbishop Gray, in 
1232, wrote to the brethren of the Hospital of St. 
John, Nottingham, a letter which is still extant. 
Here also, in 1530, came Cardinal Wolsey, whom 
some call " the greatest political genius England 
ever produced." After having studied the hearts 
of men, he was glad to commune with nature, and 
to muse over the fickleness of pi^inces' favors. 
He had been Archbishop of York by title sixteen 
years before visiting the province over which he 
was placed. He spent three months at Scrooby 
before going to the chief city of his see. He 
died at Leicester, November 29, 1530. Among 
his last written words was a request to the king 
" to depress this new pernicious sect of the 
Lutherans." 



CHAPTER IV 

NOTTINGHAM AND THE ROBEN HOOD COUNTRY 

The county or shire of Nottingliam is not 
varied and hilly like Derby, its famous neighbor 
on the west. Its climate is much drj^er, for it lies 
just out of the influence of those great hill-ranges 
which form the backbone of England and attract 
tTie rain clouds. The name " Nottingham " means 
the home of dens or caves. These, excavated out 
of the New Red Sandstone series of rocks, are 
very numerous in its southern portion. 

Dull as it looks to the traveler seeking bold 
scenery, this is the county of Maid Marian, 
and of Robin Hood, Friar Tuck, Little John, 
and the other gay fellows who lived in Sherwood 
Forest. It is the scene of Sir Walter Scott's 
" Ivanhoe," and of Arthur Sullivan's opera of the 
same name. To be sure, nobody knows whether 
such persons having those particidar names ever 
lived, though something like documentary proof 
of the existence of Robin Hood is not wholly 
lacking. To have been in English prose and 
poetry for over six hundred years, and to be read 
about in one of the first books printed in Eng- 
land, makes rather respectable antiquity. It was 



36 THE EOBIN HOOD COUNTRY 

" The Little Jest of Robin Hood " in wliieli the 
English people at large first saw tlieir native 
language put in type, by the Dutch printer Wyn- 
ken de Worde and his compositors and press- 
men. This booklet contained a string of popular 
ballads. It was the " libretto " of a sort of rustic 
opera, a widespread annual celebration of country 
sports and masquerading, in which the fat friar, 
the expert archer, the tall John, and the pretty 
maid were gayly represented. With this came 
to be associated all sorts of merry games, athlet- 
ics, dances, and masquerades, often coarse and 
even lewd. The fun, the songs, and the dances 
extended through Nottingham into other coun- 
ties. This annual " epidemic of rapture " gave 
the reformers much trouble to put down. No 
doubt the young folk of Scrooby enjoyed the 
lively revels, and the Puritan leaders had hard 
work to stop the excesses. On the other hand. 
King James, who hated " Papists, Puritans, and 
Precisians," in the " Dance Book " of 1618 al- 
lowed May-games, Whitsun ales, Morris dances, 
leaping, vaulting, and acrobatic shows on Sunday 
afternoons to all those who would attend the state 
church. It is right here in this county of Notts 
that we find more about Robin Hood and the 
places made famous by him, or the legends about 
him, than in any other shire of England. 

Scrooby is in the district of " Basset Law." 
The old Danish term " law " means something 



THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 37 

fixed or set, whether a custom, a writing, or a 
hill. It is often applied to rising or strikingly 
visible ground, hard and immovable. All through 
North Endand and Scotland this word " law " 
refers to a hill, especially one standing alone and 
not in ranges. Probably the most remarkable 
natural feature in the " flat and featureless " north 
half of Notts is this Berset or Basset Hill, Long 
ago it was called the Basset Law or "lawe," 
which has given its name to the " hundred." 

This division of the land was made by the Ger- 
manic tribes which settled England. As a unit of 
arrangement it was originally based on the num- 
ber of fighting meu furnished. Ten tithings of 
freeholders made a " hundred," and ten families 
a " ton," or town. The " hundred " afterwards 
became the basis of taxes and other financial and 
political matters. In the divisions of land in 
America, the systems varied, but there were the 
" hundreds " in Pennsylvania, Virginia, Mary- 
land, and Delaware. In the Chesapeake Bay 
State they served as election districts. In the 
State of Delaware they were retained longest. 

Nottingham produces coal, but it is far down 
below the surface. It was long after the Pil- 
grims went away that the coal measures were 
reached by drilling under the overlying strata of 
clay. By this application of science coal mines 
were opened and developed and new industries 
were established ; and now Nottingham laces, 



38 THE EOBIN HOOD COUNTRY 

curtains, and stockings have become as household 
words in every land where English is spoken. 

The sixteenth century seemed a very wonder- 
ful one to our fathers. Great changes took place 
within the four countries in the British Isles, 
both in politics, religion, and commerce. Drake 
ploughed " the first English furrow round the 
world." England began to influence more and 
more potently other nations, and to be more and 
more influenced by them. Henry VIII. broke 
with the Pope of Rome, and Italian power in Eng- 
land largely ceased. The old monasteries, of 
which there were a great many in Northern Eng- 
land, — Scrooby being in the midst of a large 
circle of them, — were suppressed. A few schools 
were founded in their place, but most of the lands, 
revenues, and buildings having been made by act 
of Parliament the property of the king, were 
made over by him to his favorite nobles. This 
high-handed act of the king was not a movement 
in favor of the people. The people, not having 
been educated in the Reformed faith, did not 
take kindly to the change from Romanism to that 
semi-reformation which afterwards became Angli- 
canism. Many famous families and men, like 
Miles Standish's kin at Duxbury Hall, in Lanca- 
shire, and Milton's grandfather and brother, re- 
mained Roman Catholics. 

There was more than one great uprising in Lin- 
colnshire against Earl Cromwell and the king's 



THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 39 

authority. " The Pilgrimage of Grace " in 1536 
was attended with riot and bloodshed, and so was 
« The Kising of the North " in 15G9. The peo- 
ple had liked the old customs and privileges, 
doles and charities, to which they had become 
used under the monastic system, and they wanted 
them again. They clamored for the " Sunday of 
joy," the hot cross buns, the dances and sports, 
the stories and jokes from the pulpit at Easter, the 
shining cross set up in the rood loft between the 
nave and the chancel, the church ales and glut- 
ton masses, the colors and varied dresses of the 
priests and monks, and the enjoyable good things 
which had been swept away along with some 
which they were not sorry to see go. The first 
insurrection was put down by King Henry VIII. 
with an iron hand. " The whole country was 
covered with gibbets." 

The second insurrection, which gathered an 
army at Doncaster, expected aid from Spain, but 
did not get it. Elizabeth in her severe punish- 
ments showed herself the daughter of Henry 
VIII., the memorials whereof still lie on the land- 
scape. " Gibbet Hill " and " Hangman's Lane," 
not far from Scrooby, tell their own story. The 
ancient Greeks erased every sign of ill-omen and 
memorial of disaster from the landscape, but the 
" Anglo-Saxon " people in both England and 
America seem to delight in things ugly and 
gloomy, and befoul much lovely scenery with hide- 



40 THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTBY 

ous names. The English people had to become 
accustomed to the new order of things, which in 
the end was for their benefit, but the change 
from the Roman to the Reformed religion went 
on slowly. 

In those times it was customary for the sheriff 
of Yorkshire to come to Bawtry, the county boun- 
dary-line, for " Scrooby water divideth the shires," 
there meet the king when he was traveling north, 
and escort him over the border. So when Bluff 
King Hal came to Bawtry in 1541, it was neces- 
sary for the noblemen and the yeomen of all that 
region to show that they were loyal to him and 
were sorry for the late rebellion called " The Pil- 
grimage of Grace." It was a grand sight when 
"two hundred gentlemen of the country in vel- 
vet, and four thousand tall yeomen and serving 
men well horsed ... on their knees made a sub- 
mission by the mouth of Sir Robert Bowes and 
presented the King with X900." A similar scene 
I have witnessed, when two thousand feudal re- 
tainers of the Prince of Echizen, all robed in silk, 
fell on their knees before their lord, in the great 
castle halls at Fukui, Japan, presenting their 
gifts and assurances of fealty. 

King Henry's wastefulness entailed great pov- 
erty and distress upon the people. A large de- 
mand for wool and sheep led to the inclosing of 
the pastures on common land which had always 
been practically the property of the people. Un- 



THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 41 

der Elizabeth things were improved in every way, 
but more particularly for the benefit of the peo- 
ple living in towns and cities than for the farm- 
inof communities. Her ambition was to unite the 
throne and the people, to weaken the power of 
the nobles, to introduce arts and manufactures, 
to improve the currency, to welcome foreigners 
who were skilled mechanics or persons of craft 
and talent. She compelled each family of the 
tens of thousands from the Netherlands who had 
come into her realm to take an English appren- 
tice, so that the country might immediately get 
the benefit of continental superiority in science, 
art and handicraft. In this way England was 
quickly changed from a purely agricultural to a 
manufacturing country, though the weaving, dye- 
ing, fulling of cloth, and the various processes 
made use of in working glass, iron, pottery, met- 
als, and wood were carried on, not in large facto- 
ries, but in private houses, exactly as I saw was 
the case in the Japan of 1870. Elizabeth person- 
ally encouraged these industries. Her visits to 
manufacturing towns, notably one to Norwich, 
were long famous for artificers' pageants and in- 
dustrial tableaux. 

The Virgin Queen was strenuous in making 
everything uniform in church and state. Her one 
idea was to make England great. In her eyes reli- 
gion was a method in politics. Whether at heart 
Elizabeth was a Protestant or a Papist, Romish 



42 THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 

or Reformed, no man knoweth unto this day. 
This queen, called " that bright Occidental Star " 
by those who saluted King James as " the Sun," 
certainly treated the Puritans even more roughly 
than she treated the Catholics. Her economic 
methods were of benefit to manufacturers, but did 
not improve the condition of the farm laborers. 
After keeping off war with Spain by means of 
her diplomacy for thirty years, she agreed to help 
the Dutch republic and thus to have the actual 
fighting done on the continent. Brave little Hol- 
land was England's outer dike of defense. 

With ten thousand English, Welsh, Irish, and 
Scottish soldiers, fighting under the red, white, and 
blue flag of the republic, thousands of British 
contractors, merchants, traders, and agents in the 
Low Countries, and a hundred thousand Nether- 
landers, mostly educated people and skilled work- 
men, in the British Isles, relations between Eng- 
land and Holland were close and varied. Through 
enlarged commerce, the English people began to 
enjoy abundantly what had been curiosities for 
the rich. These were new vegetables and other 
articles of food, gay and substantial clothing, 
starch and white linen goods, bricks and brick 
houses, improved ploughs, pleasure carriages, well- 
made wagons, carpets, looking-glasses, and ten 
thousand new and wonderful comforts and novel- 
ties which made life, not only in English towns 
and cities, but also in the rural districts, very dif- 



THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 43 

ferent from what it had been in the days of 
Robin Hood, or in the fifteenth century. 

Southern and especially eastern England was 
most rapidly and thoroughly affected by these 
changes for the better. It is out of the eastern 
counties, until quite modern times, that most of 
England's men of civil abilities and military 
power, and her chief wealth, have come. The 
western counties were more famous for their 
ships and sailors. In northern England the popu- 
lation was sparse, and the people more rude and 
ignorant. There were few schools. Education 
was very backward. The Roman Catholic spirit 
was much stronger than in the freer south. The 
people were more attached to the monks and 
lords, the castles and monasteries. The great 
mass of population, as well as of wealth, was in 
the southern shires, where the people were peace- 
ful, progressive, and up to the times. There was 
a bitter sectional feeling between the north and 
the south, the poorer and more priest-ridden 
northerners envying the wealth and comfort of 
the more commercial southerners. So far back 
as 1361 we find Queen Margaret moving with an 
army on London, only to be beaten by Edward 
IV. at the battle of Towton. " The Pilgrimage 
of Grace " in 1537 and " the Uprising of the 
North " in 1569, which were animated with the 
same envy, were the last attempts of the north 
forcibly to express opposition to the south. 



44 THE ROBIN HOOD COUNTRY 

Until about 1590, then, the people of northern 
Nottingham, and of the little hook of Yorkshire 
which comes into Notts, lived their quiet lives, 
unvexed by the great world without, though they 
had excitement enough at home with the " bruits," 
and the uprisings, and the royal armies sent to 
suppress these, whenever words of complaint 
turned to acts of violence. America had been 
discovei'ed by the Venetian Cabot sailing from 
Bristol in 1497, nearly a century before, but fifty 
years went by before the fact was popularly 
known, or any allusion had been made to it in 
an English book. What we Americans know so 
well about Sir Walter Raleigh's attempts to colo- 
nize the Carolinas was almost unheard of in 
northern England, for most of Raleigh's colonists 
were Irishmen and southerners. 

Of many of the counties in England we may 
say that they were, from the point of view of 
farm laborers, almost like foreign countries, hav- 
ing different dialects, manners, customs, ideas, 
and superstitions. The general condition of the 
people in the northern counties was much like 
that of the mountain whites of "Appalachian 
America " fifty years ago. In these people of 
the plateau formed by western North Carolina 
and eastern Kentucky and Tennnesee, we see 
our " contemporary ancestors," who still use about 
two hundred old English expressions which are 
obsolete elsewhere, and which uneducated Britons 
think are " Americanisms." 



CHAPTER V 

WILLIAM BREWSTER 

Men believe tliat tliey are hearing the Divine 
Voice when they are called to reform manifest 
abnses. So felt the English Puritans of the six- 
teenth centnry, among whom were those who later 
became Separatists. In the development in north- 
ern England of the Pilgrims, we may discern five 
notable factors. These were the Bible in Eng- 
lish, the presence of the Anabaptists in England, 
the visit of William Brewster to the Netherlands, 
the coming at Brewster's invitation of three other 
Cambridge men into the Pilgrim district, and the 
system of inclosui-es for sheep pastures, which 
made farndng a losing occupation, and so inclined 
many plain people to emigrate. The leaders of 
the movement in Gainsborough and Scrooby 
were four men, Brewster, Robinson, Clifton, and 
Smyth, each of whom had been trained in Cam- 
bridge University. The first and greatest of them 
was Brewster, and the next was Robinson. 

In English intellectual history Oxford has 
stood for privilege, royalty, high churchism, things 
conservative, and faith in things as they are and 
have been, — the safe side. This was the prevail- 



46 WILLIAM BREWSTER 

ing sentiment and feeling in the mitldle counties 
of England, which were not so easily influenced 
by the continent or the ocean and foreign com- 
merce. On the other hand, Cambridge has stood 
for the people, for freedom and progress, and for 
the truth, not only that has been, but which is 
and is to be, Cambridge is the product of, and 
has profoundly influenced, eastern England. It 
is in close and living touch with that great region 
from Lincolnshire to Kent, between the backbone 
of England's central hills and the German Ocean. 
Cambridgeshire borders those counties of Essex, 
Suffolk, and Norfolk, which have ever been quick 
to respond to the fertilizing ideas, commerce, and 
intellectual movements of continental Europe. 
It is closest to Holland, from which it has bor- 
rowed most of her republican ideas. This region 
of country is very homelike to Americans, because 
of familiar names and idioms, and as the birth- 
place of so many of their ancestors. We could 
not imagine a Pilgrim movement starting from 
Oxford, especially from sixteenth-century Oxford, 
where during one of its many I'eactions Cranmer, 
Latimer, and Ridley were burned. It is easier 
to think that to Cambridge, far more than to 
Oxford, the United States and the world owe 
immeasurable debts of gratitude. 

The man who emerges as the beginner of the 
Pilgrim movement was William Brewster, whose 
father had charge of the relay station or post at 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 47 

Scrooby, and who was born before 1567. He 
grew up in the village, seeing whatever came into 
the place from the great world outside. When 
the king's messengers changed horses, drank their 
ale, or took their supper and breakfast at his 
father's inn, he was apt to hear news. Occasion- 
ally some gay or even royal lady would pass that 
way. Margaret, Queen of Scotland, daughter of 
King Henry VII., slept at Scrooby on the 12th 
of June, 1503, on her way northward. Perhaps 
as a great curiosity, new and strange, the young 
Brewster would see a man burning tobacco in a 
bowl, and "drinking the smoke," as people used 
to say in those days. He little realized then that 
he would one day be a cultivator of the weed in 
its home-land beyond the Atlantic. After he had 
been to school somewhere in the neighborhood, 
probably at Bawtry, he went to Cambridge. It 
is not at all improbable that he walked the whole 
way thither. Thirteen of the seventeen colleges 
now forming the university were then in exist- 
ence. Brewster entered Peterhouse, the oldest 
college of all, founded in 1284, and made his 
first record, December 3, 1580. An English col- 
lege in those days was much like some of our 
smaller " universities," — little more than a gram- 
mar school. Though it is quite probable that 
Brewster did not graduate or take a degree, yet 
he was long enough at Cambridge to come under 
the influences of the Puritan preachers, and to 



48 WILLIAM BREWSTER 

become most decidedly earnest in his Christian 
character. 

Brewster was called away from his studies to 
help William Davison, who had long been Eliza- 
beth's envoy at Antwerp. Davison had in 1583 
traveled from London to Scotland, which was 
then to an Englishman like a foreign countiy, and 
so continued to be until after Cromwell's time. 
It is almost a certainty that Davison stopped 
at Scrooby inn, where he may have met young 
Brewster, then about sixteen or seventeen. Davi- 
son was on royal business, to head off an alliance 
which the French wanted to make with the Scot- 
tish King James VI. When in 1585 Elizabeth 
fuially concluded to join forces with the Dutch 
United States in order to helj) the cause of free- 
dom, and keep the Spaniards occupied and away 
from England, Davison was dispatched as her 
envoy to negotiate terms, for the thrifty queen 
wanted to be sure of getting back the money 
loaned. Holland and Zealand were in reality 
fighting England's battle, and the States were 
paying her troops, yet she acted more like a 
usurer than a friend, requiring them to deliver 
up two towns and a fort as security. These were 
to be garrisoned by English governors, and to be 
put under martial law. Under Providence it was 
this arrangement that gave not only Sir Philip 
Sidney to Holland, but Miles Standish to Amer- 
ica. The English garrisons were maintained even 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 49 

during seven years of the Twelve Years' Truce, 
1609-1621. 

Just as the Japanese submitted to the humilia- 
tion of " extraterritoriality " for over forty years, 
so did the Dutch Republicans for thirty-one years 
(until Barneveldt's masterly statesmanship re- 
lieved them), since it was a matter of life and 
death with them to get English aid. So they 
handed over at once, in token of their good faith, 
the great iron keys of the city gates of Flushing 
on the Scheldt, Brill on the Maas, and the fort of 
Rammekens on Walcheren. This island, owing 
to the fact that so many fine vegetables and table 
delicacies, then practically unknown in England, 
were imported thence, came to be called " Queen 
Elizabeth's kitchen garden." These keys of the 
" cautionary towns " were ponderous affairs, and 
were held on a great iron ring. They were so 
heavy that Davison could not well carry them 
around with him. So he gave them in charge of 
the young college boy, Brewster, who proudly 
slept with them at night under his pillow. Prob- 
ably the young Puritan was familiar with the 
text in Isaiah xxii. 22. 

Davison had long lived in Antwerp, where his 
children were born, and where he was an elder in 
an English Puritan church. The Pilgrims were 
not the first Englishmen who fled to the Low 
Countries for freedom's sake, for there were Eng- 
lish churches at Antwerp, Middelburg, and Emb- 



50 WILLIAM BREWSTER 

den, as well as in other places on the continent, 
such as Frankfort and Geneva, where the Puritan 
parties formed their opinions and polity, and made 
the popular English Bible. Davison knew the 
freedom of thought, religion, and publishing in 
the democratic Netherlands, and his influence in 
training Brewster was excellent. The female 
ruler of England generally followed very good 
advice when she listened to Davison, who told her 
truly what kind of people the Dutch were, though 
he thereby shocked those insular prejudices, so 
many of which Americans have foolishly inherited. 

The relations between Davison and Brewster 
must have been very close and even affectionate. 
Bradford declares that Davison trusted Brewster 
above all that were about him, and employed him 
in all matters of greatest trust and secrecy, esteem- 
ing him rather as a son than a servant. In pri- 
vate he talked with him more like a friend than 
a master, and thought much of the lad because of 
his wisdom and godliness. 

Landing at Vlissingen, or " Flushing," as 
English people call the port city of Zealand, the 
Puritan master, Davison, and his young servant, 
Brewster, rode to Middelburg, at which city the 
Pilgrim story may, in a very important sense, be 
said to have begun. Here the Anabaptists were 
first in Europe given liberty of conscience, and 
here Robert Browne, besides finding asjdum and 
toleration, printed and issued his books which 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 51 

first taught in English the Congregational idea 
of church government. Within the period of 
six score years, between stadholder and great- 
grandson, the toleration secured in the Nether- 
lands by William the Silent, in 1577, and in 
England under William III. of " ever blessed 
memory," in 1688, lies the story of the begin- 
ning and matui-ing of the Pilgrim enterprise. In 
short, the definite epoch of the Pilgrims in their 
three homes fills a little more than a century. 
Brewster entered Holland just after the death of 
the man whom the Dutch called Father of his 
Country, and Plymouth Colony ceased when Wil- 
liam III. became King of England. 

It must have been a wonderful experience for 
this bright young Englishman to travel in a 
state so highly civilized as Holland, which then 
was in many respects, especially in social refine- 
ment and the comforts of life, far superior to 
Brewster's native country. He saw gayly dressed 
and well-fed peoj^le in many walled cities, excel- 
lent farms, well-made and well-kept roads, noble 
church edifices, superb city halls, dwellings built 
of brick, and striking cleanliness everywhere, 
while the carillons of bells in the spires doubtless 
pleased his ear. 

We may be sure that so observing and keen- 
minded a man as Brewster afterwards showed 
himself to be could not fail to notice especially 
those things which were very different from what 



52 WILLIAM BBEWSTEB 

one could find in the England of his time, such 
as the federal union of seven states, self-govern- 
ment of cities, judges independent of the execu- 
tive, the democratic spirit of the churches, jjublic 
schools for the youth and free instruction to poor 
children, the freedom of the press, and the liberty 
of printing and publishing. He could not but 
note the toleration granted to Roman Catholics, 
Jews, Anabaptists, and other people without 
the state church. These " dissenters," though 
not allowed public processions or parades, or 
crosses or symbols on the outside of their places 
of worship, were perfectly free indoors and suf- 
fered no molestation. The great number of peo- 
ple able to read and write, of cheap books and 
pictures, of schools, hosisitals, orphan asylums, 
and benevolent institutions, must have impressed 
Brewster ; while the number and variety of manu- 
factures, the gayety of the markets, the vast fish- 
eries and tremendous commerce, — proportionally 
so much greater than anything then known in his 
own country, — opened his eyes to the wonderful 
world beyond his native island. Above all, this 
idea of liberty of conscience, the devoutness and 
earnestness of the Dutch Puritans, and the deter- 
mination of all, Protestants and Catholics alike, to 
fight Spain until their freedom was acknowledged, 
must have kindled new thoughts in the mind of 
William Brewster. 

How the English and Irish troops, led by Rob- 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 53 

ert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, landed at Flushing 
and marched to the Hague, amid bonfires, pa- 
geants, fireworks, and every sort of civic rejoi- 
ing, can be seen in the Dutch picture galleries, 
and read in Leicester's correspondence and the 
state papers of both countries. The Netherland- 
ers are famous for making calls on New Year's 
Day, a custom which Dutchmen introduced into 
the American United States. Davison, and pos- 
sibly young Brewster, was present during that 
memorable call on New Year's morning of Jan- 
uary 14, 1586, when the deputies of the States- 
General offered the earl the absolute government 
of the Low Countries. Strange as it may seem, 
the democratic and Calvinistic forces rallied 
around Leicester, while the aristocratic and state- 
rights elements gathered about Barneveldt. 

Leicester's head was turned by such an honor 
and he accepted. Sidney and Davison did not 
dissuade him from doing this, though it was in 
direct violation of Elizabeth's command, and woe- 
fully did the queen make her servant rue his pre- 
sumptuous act. With vast pomp Leicester was 
installed governor and captain-general of the 
Union of states on February 6. Instead of 
his dispatching explanations to the queen much 
sooner, especially as a fair wind was blowing, 
Davison was not sent from the Hague until Feb- 
ruary 5. He was to sail at once from Brill, but 
he and Brewster were detained by stormy weather 



54 WILLIAM BREWSTER 

five or six clays, so that they did not arrive in 
London until February 13. 

Long before this, Elizabeth had heard that the 
Countess of Leicester was about to join the earl 
in Holland, with a train of ladies, and such rich 
" coaches, litters, and side-saddles " as should 
make a court which would surpass her own. This 
made the jealous queen furious and stirred her to 
" extreme choler and dislike of all the earl's pro- 
ceedings." With strong language she declared 
she would have " no more courts under her obei- 
sance than her own." Davison on his arrival had 
to hear the queen's wrath against both himself and 
Leicester, and later the ungrateful earl managed 
to throw most of the blame, which his own folly 
deserved, upon Davison. But the latter defended 
himself with spirit ; and the treaty with Scotland 
having been concluded successfully on the 17th 
of July, and the Scottish commissioners dismissed 
in good humor, Walsingham wrote to Leicester 
on July 22 that Elizabeth " seemeth to be dis- 
posed to make Mr. Davison my assistant in the 
place I serve." This she did, though the warrant 
was not issued until the 12th of December, 1586. 
Part of Davison's business while in office was to 
efPect the transportation from Ireland to the 
Netherlands of a further contingent of one thou- 
sand Irishmen, as part of the British forces fight- 
ing for freedom. 

When he came back after a year's absence, 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 55 

Brewster was no longer merely a country lad or 
college student. 

Tlie Dutch United States had honored Davi- 
son, as they usually did the foreign envoys that 
pleased them, with a gold chain. Arriving in 
England, Davison put this gold chain on young 
Brewster as his own charge, and commanded him 
to wear it as they rode through the country till 
they came into the queen's presence. 

The episode of William Brewster's presence in 
Holland at a critical period in Dutch history, and 
during the movement of the Calvinistic demo- 
cratic and unionist elements in the federal repub- 
lic, which Davison could not but favor, is of great 
significance to the philosophic student of Pilgrim 
history. Brewster must then and there have 
seen clearly the difference between the forces 
making for the uplifting of the common people 
and the consolidation of a strong and united na- 
tion, and those which nourished aristocracy, privi- 
lege, and wealth, and even secession. Evidently 
he went back to his old home mightily reinforced 
in heart and intellect. His whole after life shows 
what principles he followed — even those which 
have made the better life of England, Holland, 
and the United States of America. 

As early as November 15, Davison, as the 
queen's secretary, wrote to Earl Leicester, ex- 
pressing Her Majesty's great grief for the loss 
at Zutphen of Sir Philip Sidney, whose elegant 



56 WILLIAM BREWSTER 

Latin has supplied the motto of that great State 
of Massachusetts, of which Brewster was to lay 
the foundation-stone. 

Remaining from the autumn of 1586 until 
February, 1587, with Davison, who was during 
this time in daily attendance upon the queen, the 
young man Brewster must have seen a good deal 
of English coui't life. All seemed to be going 
well with him, and he was apparently destined to 
become a shining figure in political life, either 
at court, in parliament, or on some foreign em- 
bassage. 

But a woman w^as destined to change the 
current of the Scrooby lad's career, to be the 
innocent cause of Davison's disgrace, to cause 
a controversy which has not yet been settled, and 
indirectly to be one of the makers of the Pilgrim 
community and of New England. This was none 
other than the beautiful Mary Stuai't, Queen of 
Scots. Elizabeth Tudor believed that she must 
put Mary to death, thinking her own throne and 
her country were not safe while the adherents of 
Rome had hopes of a living leader. Elizabeth, 
however, who was as unscrupulous as she was 
brave, and who alwa5^s sought to have a scape- 
goat on whom she could throw any odium which 
might come from her own acts, selected Davison 
as her beast of evil burden. She first allowed 
her wrath to explode upon him, and then drove 
him into the Tower solitudes. 



WILLIAM BREWSTER 57 

In February, 1587, it was published abroad 
that the Scottish queen had been beheaded. 
Davison was then imprisoned, and Brewster re- 
turned to live with his father at Seroobj, As a 
popular and beloved friend and gentleman, his 
true character shone as brightly in the country 
village as at court or in foreign lands. His 
father's health was failing, and young Brewster 
did the real work at the relay station, as his 
father and grandfather had done before him. 
Although the royal postmaster-general in London 
wanted to appoint one of his own relatives, a 
lawyer of Gray's Inn, to the vacant position, and 
all the more because yovmg Brewster was not that 
kind of an office-seeker that flatters men who have 
patronage to dispense, yet though largely through 
Davison's earnest exertions, William Brewster 
was appointed as post at Scrooby on the great 
North Road to Scotland. It was most probably 
about this time that he married. 

There were four of these posts, or royal routes 
from London, three of which went towards for- 
eign countries, and one to the place whence dis- 
tant voyages were most frequent. The first led 
to the north into the foreign country of Scot- 
land ; the second westward to Anglesea and across 
the Irish Sea to Ireland ; the third southward 
to Dover and the continent ; and the fourth to 
Plymouth, where was the chief naval station. The 
method of the posts was much like that which 



58 WILLIAM BEEWSTEB 

I saw and used in 1871 in Japan. It was not 
like our " pony express " over the Western plains, 
before the days of railways, in that it was very 
much slower. It was for travel and the exchange 
of horses rather than for the carrying of letters. 

With other perquisites, Brewster's salary 
amounted to about fifteen hundred dollars a 
year, at a time when money was worth four times 
what it is now, thus making fine pay. This ena- 
bled him to entertain, often at his own charges, 
as Bradford tells us, the whole Pilgrim company 
to dinner, when they would come to the manor 
house for worship. Some of these earnest peo- 
ple walked from two to twenty miles for this 
purpose. Among them was one, Gervaise Nevell, 
who, as I have good reason for believing, was a 
kinsman to my own ancestors. He was destined 
to be the first Pilgrim caught, imprisoned, and 
summoned before the court at York for " Brown- 
ism." He afterwards fled to Amsterdam. 

Fi'om the first, Brewster was the soul of the 
Pilgrim company, and this was before any Puri- 
tan minister who was also a Separatist had come 
into the region. Throughout his adult life he 
was the generous provider, the nursing father of 
the Pilgrim church. Yet one would not appreci- 
ate him rightly who did not pay proper tribute 
also to his intellectual abilities and personal influ- 
ence. From first to last, as must not be forgot- 
ten, the Pilgrim church, like the very first Chris- 



WILLIAM BEEWSTEE 59 

tian churches, was not only composed of, but was 
served and managed by laymen, — a majority of 
the congregation of believers forming the simple 
and sufficient government, under Christ their 
only over-lord and master. As the Pilgrims read 
the New Testament, they found in it no trace of 
a clerical caste. Neither did they discover power 
in any corporation, ecclesiastical or political, out- 
side of the congregation, that insures validity of 
ordination. Brewster not only found freedom of 
conscience in the Bible, but at Scrooby he pub- 
lished the news of a country which practiced and 
guaranteed it. 



CHAPTER VI 

WILLIAM BRADFORD 

Next to Brewster the chief man o£ the Pilgrim 
company, taking all things into consideration, was 
William Bradford, who was baptized March 19, 
1590, and was brought to baptism by Henry 
Fletcher, who made the record in the register. 
Bradford's father was a j^eoman, and died when 
the boy was about a year old. 

After his father's death young Bradford was 
put under the care of his grandfather, who died 
when he was about six years old. He was then 
brought up by his three uncles, William, Thomas, 
and Robert Bradford. William's grandfather 
and old William Bradford were the two subsidy- 
men, or tax collectors, at Austerfield, and when 
young Bradford's uncle Robert died, his will 
showed that he owned an iron-bound wagon, while 
in his " house," which in old country English 
means the sitting, or " living " room, were a cup- 
board and a long settee, or bench. He had also 
armor and leases of land. His aco[uaintances and 
connections show that he was one of the most 
important persons in the village. If the tradi- 
tion that the dwelling pointed out in Austerfield 



WILLIAM BRADFORD 61 

to-day as the home of Bradford be correct, then 
in the fact that they lived in a brick house — 
poor and small though it seem to us — we have 
a further argument to show that the Bradfords 
were of importance and of high character. Brew- 
ster was twenty-three years old when Bradford 
was born, which was on the day that the former 
was appointed post of Scrooby. 

Bradford grew up in the village, the centre of 
which was the little chapel. He had a long sick- 
ness, which left him a delicate boy, and helped to 
fit him to become the serious man that he after- 
wards was. Even when about a dozen years old, 
the reading of the Scriptures fed his imagination 
and made a profound impression upon his mind. 
Very probably, after learning to read, he gained 
what knowledge he could from the books of the 
Eev. Mr. Silvester, of Alkly, the guardian of his 
cousins, who had not only some land, but also an 
English and Latin library. 

Bradford's impressions were much assisted and 
improved when he heard the preaching of the 
Rev. Richard Clifton at Babworth, about ten 
miles away, to whose church and rectory Brad- 
ford no doubt often walked. 

Dr. Cotton Mather, who tells us these things, 
says that Bradford was further befriended by 
being brought into the company and fellowship 
of earnest Christian young men, though one of 
those who at first most influenced him afterwards 



62 WILLIAM BRADFORD 

became profane and wicked. He adds : " Nor 
could the wrath of his uncles, nor the scoff of his 
neighbors, now turned upon him as one of the 
Pui'itans, divert him from his pious inclination. 
. . . He set himself by reading, by discourse, by 
prayer, to learn whether it was not his duty to 
withdraw from the communion of the parish as- 
semblies, and to engage with some society of the 
faithful that should keep close unto the written 
Word of God, as the rule of their worship." 

As a true Christian soldier Bradford learned 
early to stand fire. After much mental distress 
he resolved to give up going to the state church, 
and began to attend as regularly as possible the 
meetings of those Christians who took only the 
written Word for their rule of life, without re- 
gard to politicians, whether lay or clerical. At 
Gainsborough and Scrooby he found the food 
which his spirit craved. " And the sudden deaths 
of the chief relations which thus lay at him quickly 
after convinced him . . . and so to Holland he 
attempted a removal." As surely as Abraham 
listened to the Divine voice, so Bradford and his 
yoke-fellows heard this call, " Wherefore come 
out from among them, and be ye separate, said 
the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing ; and 
I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, 
and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the 
Lord Almighty." 

We do not know, and can but guess that tradi- 



WILLIAM BRADFORD 63 

tion is possibly correct in hinting that for Brad- 
ford, at least, one of the attractions at church was 
the pretty face of the girl whom years after- 
wards he married in America. What English 
maids in their beauty are, we know well by sight 
and not merely by faith. What they were in 
Bradford's day we learn from Erasmus. Does 
he not tell us that they were " divinely fair " ? 
and well did this Rotterdammer know. No need 
for them to paint their cheeks of damask and 
rose ; for as a German traveler once said of Eng- 
lish ladies, '' They do not heretic their faces." 

Let us now look at those Puritan ministers who 
gave up their livings under the political establish- 
ment in order to serve a church founded on the 
primitive New Testament model. The first was 
Richard Clifton, originally from Derby, the next 
county to Notts. He was thirty-three years old 
when he came, probably at Brewster's invitation 
or through his influence, to Babworth, July 12, 
1586. He showed himself to be an advanced 
preacher who believed thoroughly in the necessity 
of reforming the church. His field of labor was 
among the farmers and farm laborers, for his 
church was in the country where there was not 
even a village. Bradford speaks of him in the 
highest terms. Another Nottinghamshire man 
and Cambridge graduate, the Rev. Richard Ber- 
nard, was made vicar of Worksop June 19, 
1601. Before this, in 1598, Bernard had been 



64 WILLIAM BRADFOBD 

in charge of the rectory at Epworth, on the river 
ishand of Axelhohne, in Lineohishire, where John 
Wesley was born and which is now the Mecca of 
the Methodists, American and British. Thus in 
one small district of northern England, wlijerein, 
one generation before the Pilgrim movement, 
the people had risen in rebellion to preserve the 
corrnpt church and the monasteries, we find the 
beginnings of three great bodies of Christians, — 
three folds of the " one flock, one Shepherd." 

Besides being a Puritan, Bernard was ready to 
be a Sejmratist. He worked with Clifton and 
Brewster, his neighbors, and went so far as to 
set up a Congregational church within his parish 
and edifice. 

The Scrooby brethren fully expected him to be 
one who through good and evil report would fol- 
low them to the goal of scriptural freedom. It 
turned out differently. When persecution, im- 
prisonment, and death showed beyond a doubt 
that episcopacy was to be established by military 
force, and when Bernard was silenced by the 
Archbishop of York, then he drew back, and, con- 
forming to the state church, wrote books against 
his former fellow workei's. Wliether he did this 
from lack of moral stamina, or from fondness for 
literary dalliance, or whether he was actuated by 
a sincere conviction of duty, God knows. Deo 
Vindice ! It was in answer to the charges of the 
vicar at Worksop that John Robinson wrote his 



WILLIAM BRADFORD ' 65 

most famous book, " A Justification of Separa- 
tion from the Church of England." 

On the other side of the Trent, in Lincohi- 
shire, Puritan sentiments among ministers who 
did not approve of the Romish ceremonies re- 
tained in the church were in some respects even 
more forward than in Nottingham. A Congrega- 
tional church was formed at Gainsborough in 
1602, probably meeting in the old Guild Hall, 
which is still standing. Brewster, Bradford, and 
those who with them had walked over from 
Scrooby met often with the people of this church. 
Their bishop, or pastor, was John Smyth, who 
had taken his degree at Christ's College, Cam- 
bridge, having for one of his tutors Francis 
Johnson, afterwards pastor of the Separatist 
church in London and Amsterdam. Johnson 
suffered for his faith at the hands of the rulers of 
England in this time of spiritual twilight. He 
fled to Amsterdam in 1606. 

About 1606 the brethren at Scrooby and on 
the western side of the Trent formed a church, 
of which the Eev. Richard Clifton, late rector at 
Babworth, became pastor. This church was or- 
ganized like those of the early Christians, by the 
free choice of the people, who elected their own 
officers, voting not by written ballot, as in Fries- 
land, but by the holding up of hands. Beside 
the teaching members of the congregation, usually 
called clergymen, and in some branches of the 



GG . WILLIAM BEADFORD 

Christian churcli made into a separate caste, 
there were the serving members or deacons. 
Clifton continued to be the chief bishop, or pas- 
tor, and John Robinson the assistant bishop, or 
pastor. 

This John Robinson, one of the makers of dis- 
tinctive America, was born, probably in Gains- 
borough, certainly in Lincolnshire, and went to 
Corpus Christi College in Cambridge, in 1592, 
entering as a freshman when but seventeen years 
old. He took his degree and was made fellow in 
1598. He settled at Norwich, but he preached in 
a way that led to his suspension. Then separating 
from the Establishment ruled by the queen, he 
became pastor of a Congregational church in 
Norwich about 1601 or 1602. So many Dutch 
Anabaptists and martyrs under " Bloody Mary " 
had been burned here, in the dry moats at the 
foot of the old Norman castle, that firewood be- 
came dear and the poor suffered from the cold. 

In this city, as is very probable, Robert 
Browne, also educated at Corpus Christi College 
in Cambridge, usually reputed to be " the founder 
of modern Congregationalism," probably got his 
first ideas of primitive Christianity from the 
Dutch Anabaptists, and his followers were called 
" Brownists." This word was for over a century 
a common term in English speech. Shakespeare 
makes one of his characters say, " I had as lief be 
a Brownist as a politician." Browne, in 1580 or 



WILLIAM BRADFORD 67 

1581, organized a church in Norwich ; but finding 
his limbs and life in danger, he fled to Zealand, 
then the most intensely Protestant state in all 
Europe. In Middelburg, he printed tracts and 
books which were smuggled into England and 
circulated by two of his fellow believers, Coppin 
and Thacker. These, when caught by the author- 
ities, in 1583, were hanged. 

It was surely not an accident that both Robert 
Browne and John Robinson, while settled in Nor- 
wich among the Dutch Anabaptists, who held to 
the congregational principles of church polity, 
should learn from them and become like them. 
Robinson neither liked nor took the name of 
" Brownist " any more than that of " Anabap- 
tist," both being terms of reproach. Like the 
Brethren themselves, both Browne and Robinson 
contended that in the Scriptures alone were found 
the source of their light and the basis of their 
church polity. 

An argument against the idea that Browne 
learned the way from the " Anabaptists " has 
been attempted to be based on the fact that the 
names of Browne's co-workers are not distinc- 
tively Dutch ; but from this nothing can be 
argued, because most of the Dutch, like the Wal- 
loons and the Huguenot emigrants to England, 
quickly translated, shortened, assimilated to Eng- 
lish sound, or otherwise anglicized their names. 
De Wilde became Savage ; van de Velde, Field ; 



68 WILLIAM BRADFORD 

clu Bois, Wood. These are but three instances 
out of a hundred that could be named. Who 
would ever suppose that Deems, Spurgeon, Dann, 
Blake, Dwight, Packard, Cooper, Scidmore, 
Hanna, Hansard, and scores of other English 
names were originally Dutch ? Johan Winkler's 
book of De Nederlandsche Geslachtsnamen 
(Dutch Ancestral Names) shows among its 
thousands hundreds that are known to have 
been altered into other forms by immigrants to 
England. 

Dutch Anabaptists were in Norwich by 1530. 
A Walloon congregation had been formed as 
early as 1570, so that by 1604 there must have 
been many English speaking children and grand- 
children of these refugees from the Flemish 
Netherlands. In the hostile writings of this era, 
the " Brownists " and " Anabaptists " were usu- 
ally identified as fraternal sects. 

John Robinson would gladly have remained in 
Norwich, but persecutions and imprisonments 
which continually troubled him and his church 
members drove him to the nortliwest, where 
he soon found that the catchpoll officers and 
minions of the bishops were just as ready there 
to do their abominable work as in Norwich. 

Elizabeth died in 1603, and the son of Mary 
Queen of Scots, James VI. of Scotland, became 
King James I. of England. On his way to Lon- 
don he passed through Scrooby, and it is possible 



WILLIAM BRADFORD 69 

that Brewster saw his future persecutor, and may 
even have served him with refreshments at the 
inn. One county sheriff, of Nottingham, met 
the king, and the other, of York, took leave of the 
king, at Bawtry. He slej^t at Worksop, lunched 
near Blyth, and hunted in Sherwood Forest. He 
showed what kind of a ruler he was going to be 
by having a man hanged at Nottingham without 
trial, which was royal lynch law. From London 
he wrote to the York prelate, offering to buy the 
manor house at Scrooby. This property had 
been transferred by Archbishop Sandys to his 
oldest son Samuel, who was Brewster's landlord, 
and brother of Edwin, later the warm friend of 
the Plymouth Colpny. 

Whatever hopes of living peaceably under this 
king the Scrooby church may have cherished 
were blown to the winds after the Hampton Court 
Conference in 1604, when the edict of " conform- 
ity or exile " went forth. In 1606 the Bishop of 
Durham, Tobias Matthews, was made Archbishop 
of York. The new prelate was a great reader of 
" Brownist " books. He had a nose for heresy as 
keen as that of a bloodhound for slave tracks. 
So early as March, 1607, this sheriff-like bishop 
began the coercion of conscience. 

The Separatists had not long to wait to see the 
bloodhound's teeth. In March, 1607, one Wil- 
liam Blanchard, a messenger, was sent to appre- 
hend Gervase Nevyle, who was " one of the sect of 



70 WILLIAM BRADFORD 

Baroists or Brownlsts liokling and maintaining 
erroneous opinions and doctrines." For such 
scliismatical obstinacy and irreligion he was to be 
delivered by straight warrant " to the hands, 
ward and safe custody of the Keeper of His 
Majesty's Castle of York." The accused ap- 
peared and made answer, March 22. It is quite 
probable that this Gervase Nevyle was kins- 
man to the writer's ancestors, the Eyres. The 
entry is in these words, " Office against Jervase 
Nevyle of Scrobie dio: Ebor." (diocese of York). 
The names of the informers who demanded that 
Richard Jackson and William Brewster, of 
Scrooby, gentlemen charged with Brownism, and 
later for not appearing " upon lawful summons 
at the collegiate church of Southwell," are also 
given. In the first hunt the seekers were unable 
to find their game, probably because the men were 
at that hour in the jail at Boston. The second 
attempt failed likewise, for they were probably 
then in Holland. The warrants issued for the 
arrest of Brewster are dated September 15 and 
December 1, 1607. A " very dangerous schis- 
matical Sej^aratist, Brownist and irreligious sub- 
ject " is the bishop's description of each gentle- 
man. 

Under such a " Defender of the Faith " and 
such " shepherds of the flock," the Scrooby Sepa- 
ratists turned Pilgrims, and began their wander- 
ing life, changing often their skies, but never 



WILLIAM BRADFORD 71 

their steadfast mind. How they fled from their 
native land, after arrest, robbeiy, and imprison- 
ment in the autumn of 1607, at Boston, and cap- 
ture and separation in the springtime of 1608, 
between Grimsby and Hull, is a familiar narra- 
tive which the limits of our space forbid retelling, 
" At sundry times and in divers manners " they 
left their first home, England, and reached their 
second home, the United States of the Nether- 
lands. 



CHAPTER VII 

" INTO A NEW WORLD " AMSTERDAM 

When the Dutch sailor says that " Amsterdam 
is built on herring bones," he tells a " fish story " 
that is true. Its name pictures the dam on the 
Amstel River, at the side of which in the thir- 
teenth century clustered fishermen's huts under 
the shadow of the feudal castle. In Dutch his- 
tory the use of the word " dam " in the end of a 
name marks the transition from the power of the 
feudal lords to that of the burghers in the cities. 
No Dutch town whose name ends in "dam" is 
older than the twelfth century, after which char- 
ters and municipal rights, wrested or bought 
from the barons and castle lords, ushered in the 
era of industry and civic freedom. The fishing- 
village on the Amstel became a town, and then a 
city. 

After Antwerp had, in 1585, been captured by 
the Spaniards, and turned over to the Jesuits, it 
ceased to be the home of freedom. Amsterdam 
then became the refuge of the ojipressed of every 
clime. Here, in 1593, as naturally as' the com- 
pass needle trembles toward the pole, moved those 
Londoners who, for having applied democracy to 



" INTO A NEW WORLD " — AMSTERDAM 73 

cliurcli polity, had been hunted out of their native 
land. There was then no waterway direct from 
Amsterdam to the German Ocean, nor was the 
North Holland canal from the Helder yet cut. 
All vessels had to go round by Texel Island, and 
into the Zuyder Zee. 

We hear of parties of these English refugees 
at Kampen, the city now so famous for its tobacco 
and theology, and at Naarden, the scene of the 
awful Si3anish massacre of 1572. Being without 
money or food, these straiided folk had to be 
helped by the town authorities ; but finally get- 
ting into Amsterdam, very poor and miserably 
rent, divided, and scattered, they formed the " An- 
cient English Church" of which Henry Ainsworth 
was teacher. At first they received some assist- 
ance from friends in London and Middelburg-. 
By 1607 their affairs had vastly improved. When 
Robinson arrived, there were no fewer than seven 
religious communities of English-speaking people 
in the great Dutch city. 

One of these, the Scottish Presbyterian church, 
formed in 1607, remains until this day, having its 
place of worship off the Kalver Straat in the Be- 
guynhof, or Court of the Beguyn Nuns. In this 
old edifice, once the cloister chapel of the " cell- 
sisters," the writer preached June 30, 1895. 
From the first, this Presbyterian church was con- 
nected with the State Establishment, and there- 
fore was given an edifice by the city magistrates, 



74 "INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 

while the Separatists had to find a place of wor- 
ship, and pay their own rent ; yet so also did 
the Jews, Catholics, Lutherans, Anabaptists, and 
other worshipers of God. 

Because of their tolerance, the Dutch repub- 
licans were made the butt and byword of the 
English politicians and of every royal persecutor 
of Europe, but they cared for these as little as 
Americans care to-day for like gibes. They 
valued freedom as life itself. 

It was a wonderful country — this land where 
conscience was free — to these people who had 
come from the interior rustic villages in the back- 
ward and thinly populated parts of northern Eng- 
land. As Bradford says, " It seemed they were 
come into a new world. They saw many goodly 
and fortified cities strongly walled and guarded 
with troops of armed men. Also they heard a 
strange and uncouth language, and beheld the 
different manners and customs of the people with 
their strange fashions and attires." It is more 
than probable that during the whole eleven years 
of their sojourn in the republic these Puritans 
wore what to the natives seemed a curious garb. 
Their English speech was " broken Dutch" to the 
Hollanders. 

Amsterdam was already one of the world's 
great markets, one of its handsomest and richest 
cities, and was destined during the seventeenth 
century to excel all. It had a bank, which was 



''INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 75 

then a new thing in northern Europe, nothing like 
it being known in England, where the rates of 
interest on money loaned were enormous. The 
city on the Amstel had mightily enlarged since 
the beginning of the war of independence against 
the Spaniards. Even in 1609 the large canals, 
new waterways, newly reclaimed land, and build- 
ing lots, were none too ample for the increase of 
the population. 

The first business of the newcomers was to find 
employment, and this they did at various occupa- 
tions. It is very probable that most of them lived 
in that part of the city where rents and houses 
were cheap, as for instance around the Binnen- 
Amstel near the Baker Straat ; that is, inside the 
Amstel River near Baker Street. Not far away 
was the street of dyehouses, on what is now the 
Groenen-burg, or the green thoroughfare anciently 
lying along the wall of the burg or castle. 

A buildino- in which some of these Eno^lish folk 
worshiped is in a place still called, as a Dutch 
woman on the spot told me, " Brownisten gang," 
or Brownists' Alley, — the word " gang " being 
the same as in Robert Burns's line, " gang aft 
agley," or in "gangway." To-day, if one visits 
this place, starting from the centre of the city, 
say the Doelen Straat, he goes north along the 
Kloveniers Burgwal (that is, by the old archery- 
path to the Culverineers' castle wall) down to the 
New Market. This is an open space, at the south 



76 ''INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 

end of which is one of the old walled city's mas- 
sive gate-houses with imposing conical towers. 
To the left he will notice one street called Blood 
Street, and another Barnde-Steeg, meaning the 
place of the burned. Here, between 1522 and 
1578, the Anabaptists and Protestants were either 
beheaded or burned. Turning to the left, down 
one of these streets, and to the right into a narrow 
alley, we find at the end an uninviting-looking 
building, several stories high, and having walls 
three or four feet thick, which is now used as a 
tenement house. In the fourteenth century this 
was a convent or house of the cell-sisters. At the 
top of the first flight of steps there is a large low- 
ceiled room in which the English refugees, and 
probably John Robinson's company, worshiped in 
1609. 

Amsterdam did not come under the control of 
magistrates of the Reformed faith until 1578. 
During Alva's reign of terror, the blood of the 
beheaded flowed and the ashes of the burned 
martyrs were cast into the canals on either side 
of Blood Street, or of the Alley of the Burned, 
and were borne down into the great haven, past 
that famous old round tower, which then, as well 
as now, was occupied by the harbor-master. Even 
in Pilgrim days it was called the Weepers' or 
Shriekers' Tower, because here ships began their 
voyage to distant lands in the orient, America, 
or at the poles. The shrieks and the cries of 



"INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 77 

weeping relatives mingled with the words of fare- 
well. 

From this very place, only a few days before 
Robinson's company arrived, their own fellow- 
countryman, Henry Hudson, (or in Irvingese, 
" Hendrik " Hudson) had sailed away. Hudson 
was a friend of Captain John Smith, who had 
just named Plymouth and sent to his fellow ex- 
plorer charts of the Massachusetts coast. With 
his first mate, Robert Juet, Hudson sailed in the 
Half Moon, both his shij) and crew being Dutch, 
to seek the northeast passage to China. Failing 
in this, he tried to reach the Asian gold lands by 
the northwest passage. He did not give up until 
he had entered the Hudson River and gone up to 
the latitude of Albany and Troy. Even then he 
hoped to find the waterway to Asia, but the shal- 
lowness of the stream flowing from the Adiron- 
dacks compelled him to turn back. Before Rob- 
inson and his company had left Amsterdam, the 
Half Moon and her Dutch crew were back again 
iu the Amstel haven, though the grasping govern- 
ment of King James detained Hudson at Plym- 
outh and did not quite give up the idea of laying 
claim to the lands of his discovery, because, for- 
sooth, he was an Englishman. New England, 
the future home of the Pilgrims, and New Nether- 
land, in which they intended to settle, received 
their names on the same day. The future " em- 
pire region " of the United States discovered by 



78 ''INTO A NEW WORLD''— AMSTERDAM 

Henry Hudson lay between New France and Vir- 
ginia ; and the name New Netherland, in the 
singular, was the symbol of the union of States in 
one federal republic. 

For a little while the church under Smyth and 
that under Johnson lived in union. Then, 
Smyth's congregation split and quarreled ; first 
on the subject of using translations of Scripture 
instead of the original, and then on the subject 
of the form of baptism. The other English 
church had its troubles because Johnson, who was 
aristocratic in his tastes, became more and more 
a Presbyterian, believing in the government of 
the church by elders ; while Ainsworth held to 
the strict New Testament idea of democracy. 
Robinson sided warmly with Ainsworth and held 
to the simple democracy of the primitive Chris- 
tian church. 

Other troubles, not wholly ecclesiastical, in the 
congregation which the Scrooby folk had joined, 
were largely on account of feminine fashions. 
This was an epoch of gorgeous clothes and extra- 
vagant fashions among all classes. By a natural 
reaction, the protest of reformers also was great. 
As Caesar had his Brutus, so Mrs. Johnson, the 
wife of the Rev. Francis Johnson, had her bro- 
ther-in-law, who threatened to kill her re^^utation. 
This puritanical critic, having had a prolonged 
quarrel with his sister-in-law in London, reopened 
the discussion in Amsterdam. He accused her 



"INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 79 

of wearing "apparel unreformed," meaning espe- 
cially gay hats and jauntily trimmed dresses. On 
the other hand, several of the brethren believed 
the brother-in-law had " a crackt brain." Fur- 
ther particulars of offense, — spicy and comical 
they seem now, — and duly fortified by scriptural 
passages, were charged against Mrs. Johnson. 
One fault was that she "laid in bed on the 
Lord's day till 9 o'clock and hindered the exercise 
of the Word," the accuser supporting this last 
charge with four Scripture passages : Ps. cxix. ; 
Is. Iviii. 13 ; Ezek. xx. 12 ; and Acts xx. 7. 

Matters were afterwards somewhat improved, 
and a truce followed for a few months, until the 
pastor's wife was so indiscreet as to buy a velvet 
hood, such as none but the richest, finest, and 
proudest ladies sought to use. This was to the 
brother-in-law as a red rag shaken at a bull. 
After much striving and wrestling of conscience 
about performing his duty, he wrote her a long 
letter which he concluded by expressing a fear 
lest " such attire will open the adversary's mouth, 
disconfute the ungodly, discredit the gospel and 
dishonor God." 

Alternate peace and storm followed ; but at all 
the meetings and conferences the main topic of 
the accuser's conversation was the pastor's wife. 
It came to pass that the venerable father of the 
husband and the brother-in-law came over from 
England to heal the difficulty, with the result 



80 "into a new WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 

that both father and brother-in-law were pnt out 
of the church. The final handling of the matter 
lasted through twelve weeks. After this excom- 
munication the controversy of years was closed, 
and a short season of peace came to the church 
of which Johnson was pastor. 

This is the sensible comment of William Brad- 
ford on this whole affair. " She (Mrs. Francis 
Johnson) was a young widow . . . and was a 
godly woman . . . Because she wore such apjjarel 
as she had formerly been used to, which were 
neither excessive nor immodest, for their ehiefest 
exceptions wei'e against her wearing of some 
whalebone in the bodice and sleeves of her gown, 
corked shoes and other such like things as the 
citizens of her rank then used to wear. And 
although for offence sake, she and he were willing 
to reform the fashions of them so far as might 
be without spoiling of their garments, yet it would 
not content them except they came full up to 
their size." Bradford then goes on to show how 
rigid were the notions of some Puritans even on 
the subject of starch. 

The late Dr. Henry Martin Dexter, who, with 
Professor de PIoop Scheff'er, has most fully stud- 
ied the history of these English people in the 
Dutch metropolis, has given the details of what 
he calls " The Old Clothes Controversy " and has 
recovered the names of over four hundred and 
fifty free churchmen. 



"into a new WOELD'' — AMSTERDAM 81 

Another and a far more serious controversy 
broke out on the question of church polity, when 
Smyth came under the influence of the " Water- 
lander" Mennonites and the Arminians, and be- 
came a Baptist. Ainsworth and his friends se- 
ceded from Johnson and his adherents, and there 
was every prospect of a long continuance of un- 
jjleasantness. This decided Robinson and his 
company to leave the Amstel and find a home 
on the Rhine. Next to Amsterdam, the richest 
and most important city of Holland was Leyden, 
which was within easy reach by canal. Here all 
were likely to gain a livelihood, for the cloth and 
woolen industries of this city were famous. The 
great university, excellent schools, and large jirint- 
ing-offices attracted the lettered men of the com- 
pany, who had found that Holland was a wonder- 
ful place for cheap books and first-rate education, 
from the free public schools to the renowned 
universities of the republic, two of which, Ley- 
den and Franeker, were then in their bloom. 

It is not difficult to picture this city on the 
Rhine in a. d. 1600, for few places on this planet 
have richer antiquities, archives, and memories in 
art. Jan Orlers, who was burgomaster of the 
municipality, has given in his oft-reprinted book 
full details of its history and administration, so 
that we know the important facts and hundreds 
of names of local officers, those from 1609 to 
1625 being of most interest to Americans. 



82 ''INTO A NEW WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 

The application of Robinson, in behalf of him- 
self and about one hundred other persons, for per- 
mission to come and reside in Leyden may still 
be read in the Court Day Book among the muni- 
cipal archives, under the date of February 12, 
1609, with the indorsed reply that " the coming 
of the Memorialists will be agreeable and wel- 
come." 

So it came to pass that in Leyden City in Hol- 
land, as well as in Leyden Street in America, the 
first sound heard from strangers who were natives 
of the asylum-lands of these Pilgrim exiles was 
the word " welcome," which they would have been 
so glad to hear in their home-land, but for which 
they had listened in vain. 

Though the story of " the ancient church " in 
Amsterdam is a sad one, disclosing disagreeable 
traits of character, yet after all it is no different 
from that of struggling man in every age and 
country. The controversies, the manifestations 
of human infirmity, and the questions at issue 
were not different or any worse than those which 
have repeatedly occupied and vexed larger organ- 
izations and more famous assemblies. No theory 
of faith or system of church government can sup- 
press or eliminate human nature. In what vital 
respect the discussions of convocations and 
synods about surplices and cassocks, gowns and 
vestments, candles and credence-stools, or the 
disputes about mysteries and dogmas, either in 



P S A L M B lOO. 



Hou't rolehovah , all the earth, i. 
Serve ye lehovah with gladnes: be fore 

him come with iinging-m rih. Knov 



pi ^^^^ 



that lehovah heGodu: 



Efi 



'OLD HUNDREDTH ■ IN AINSWORTH'S PSALM BOOK 



1. hhout to Jehovali all the earth. 

2. Serve ye Jehovah with ijladness : before liini come 

with singing-mirth. 

3. Know that Jehovah lie God is. It's he that made us 

and not we, his flock and sheep of his feeding. 

4. Oh, with confession enter ve his gates, his covirtyard 

with praising. Confess to him. bless ye his 
name. 

5. Because Jehovah he good is : his mercy ever is the 

same, and his faith unto all ages. 



''into a new WORLD'' — AMSTERDAM 83 

past centuries or in this generation, differ from 
those among the Separatists at Amsterdam in 
1609, cannot be easily discerned. 

Those Christians who were nicknamed " Brown- 
ists " maintained a church or churches in Amster- 
dam until 1701, though before that time most 
of them had united with the Dutch Baptists, 
Mennonites, or Friends, or had entered the Re- 
formed church. Among them was the polished 
scholar and journalist William Sewall (1654- 
1720), who made an English-Dutch dictionary, 
and wrote a " History of the Quakers." 

Music was cultivated by the Separatists. As 
early as 1562, the English hymns they sang had 
been put into metre and set to notes. In 1612 
Henry Ainsworth published in Amsterdam " The 
Book of Psalmes, Englished both in Prose and 
Metre," which had thirty-nine separate tunes in 
it. For eighty years this book was part of the 
daily spiritual food of the Pilgrims on both sides 
of the Atlantic. Ainsworth, known all over Eu- 
rope as a leading Hebrew scholar, whose annota- 
tions have helped even the makers of the Revised 
Version of 1885, was so poor a poet, and his verses 
were so uncouth, that the Continental scholars at 
first imagined there must be two Ainsworths. In 
trying to unravel the mystery, some of them got 
badly tangled up in their own higher criticism. 
More than one half of Ainsworth's tunes show 
their Netherlandish environment. 



CHAPTER VIII 

" A PAIR AND BEAUTIFUL CITY " — LEYDEN 

AmSTEEDAM in 1609 was only about one third 
of its present size. The great trijile line of 
" grachts " which, like semi-circles, inclose the 
old and form part of the crescent city had not 
then been dug, nor were the inclosed spaces built 
upon, though this work of enlargement was car- 
ried out in the seventeenth century. The Dutch 
make a difference between a " gracht " and a 
canal. The former is one of the city moats or 
waterways. A canal is a longer water passage, 
generally between two cities, and is a highway 
for travel. " Gracht " is the more common word 
for a waterway within or near the city walls, and 
" canal " is used to designate a waterway from 
one place to another. The Pilgrims loaded their 
boats in a " gracht." They traveled by "canal " 
to Leyden. 

We can imagine the little flotilla freighted 
with household goods and crowded with plainly 
and soberly dressed English people, conspicuous 
among whom was the dignified John Robinson. 
In clerical garb, and wearing a cap which looked 
exactly like a watermelon cut in half, with per- 



"A FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 85 

haps a little band o£ lace around the bottom, and 
wearing also a ruff around liis neck, he would be 
easily recognized. Brewster, the man in middle 
life, being forty-two years old, and Bradford, the 
young bachelor of nineteen, would perhaps be 
prominent. The women and children would en- 
joy the outing in the lovely springtime, as they 
passed through the garden region of Europe, 
where even at that early time the tulips were 
gorgeous and the other cultivated flowers magnifi- 
cent. Where now, however, are square miles of 
bloom and color or rich pastures dotted with 
cows, was then a colossal checker-board of green 
with squares of white, for there were acres of 
linen bleaching on the sward. Chlorine was not 
then isolated or its virtues recognized, but some 
qualities in the water of the Spaarn River and the 
skill of the bleachers, who deftly handled their 
wooden shovels as sprinklers, made Haarlem linen 
famous throughout the world. 

The journey would be along the Haarlem Canal 
from the city until they got into the Haarlemmer 
meer or lake, on which naval battles between the 
Dutch and Spaniard had been fought. During 
the siege of Leyden, relief had been sent by boats 
in summer, and on sledges over the ice in winter, 
to the garrison, for the water washed the walls of 
both cities. The lake no longer exists, but in its 
place is an area of gorgeously blooming gardens, 
the richest bulb-lands in Holland, with villages, 



86 "A FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 

farms, hedges, and liigliways over which one rides 
in the steam tram. In our century, after many 
years of pumping by wind and steam mills, the 
bottom of the lake has been made visible and use- 
ful. A whole museum of curiosities, consisting 
of anchors, ship timber, and ship iron, relies of 
human beings and accoutrements of soldiers and 
sailors, came to light as the waters lowered. 

With the fields so green, the mild-eyed cows 
grazing everywhere, the birds in immense num- 
bers flitting about, it must have been an enjoyable 
trip both to the parents and to the children, who 
would note many things and clap their hands in 
glee over what adults might ignore. AVhile trav- 
ersing the lake and the green fields of South 
Holland, they saw that the great flat landscape 
was everywhere dominated by the church spire. 
In the distance, on their left, were the shining 
waters of the Zuyder Zee. On the right rose the 
great sand hills, or dunes, which form Holland's 
wall of defense against the ocean. This pretty 
counti-y, not so very different in those days from 
the flat lands, marshy fens, and watei'-courses of 
Nottingham and Lincoln, would be in view all 
day. After the walls and great church sj)ire of 
Haarlem had been left far behind, they would, 
probably late in the afternoon, come within sight 
of the turreted gates and walls of Leyden, gay 
with the orange, white, and blue flag of the fed- 
eral republic. They would see the great church 



"A FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 87 

of St. Peter, " as an elephant stands among com- 
mon cattle," under the shadow of which was to be 
their home, the roof of St. Pancras, the glorious 
bulb spire of the State House, from which bells 
sounded out sweet chimes, and the Burg, the cen< 
tral landmark and the highest mass of land within 
the city. 

While on the lake they were in the open, 
but when nearing Ley den they turned aside into 
smaller and narrowing bits of water, each having 
its own name, until they came to the Rhine, which 
flows through and incloses Leyden. At the Zijl 
Poort, or Canal Gate, they would be challenged 
by the guard. When it was found that their 
papers were all right, they would be admitted. 
Then they would be allowed to take up their quar- 
ters, which probably they had already selected, in 
the northwestern part of the city on and near St. 
Ursula Street. It is very likely that some of the 
company ftom Amsterdam had already found 
employment and established their quarters in 
" the northern Venice," and that they were pre- 
sent to welcome the newcomers. Yet even while 
the little company waited in the canal outside, 
they could see, besides the many windmills, the 
spires of the halls of the guilds, in which silk, 
fustian, and veils were finished, approved, stamped, 
and sold. Leyden was a great emporium for the 
manufacture of all kinds of woven goods ; and 
next to finding peace and quiet to serve God, the 



88 "^ FAIE CITY'' — LETBEN 

idea of these Pilgrims on their second journey 
was to get work, that they might have food and 
the comforts of life. 

Leyden had flourished and grown up largely 
through the woolen manufactures. The first 
canal ever cut and embanked for the making; of 
a dam was that wherein the wool-men washed 
their fleeces. The earliest streets took their 
names from the industries of those who dealt or 
wrought in wool, — clipping, washing, combing, 
carding, weaving, and finishing it. When the 
Pilgrims arrived, there were no large factories 
with machinery as there are now, but there were 
hundreds of houses devoted to the washing, clean- 
ing, dyeing, carding, combing, weaving, and all 
the other occupations connected with the working 
of wool and the manufacturing of cloth. These 
are represented in English by the names of oc- 
cupations, families, and places, such as Webb, 
Webber, Webster, Weaver, Blake, Blakeslee, 
Dyer, Spinner, Burrell, Fuller ; and, in combina- 
tion, Washington, Fullerton, and hundreds of 
others ; and in Dutch by even older forms of 
slightly different spelling and pronunciation. 
These names, which are common among us to-day, 
show the honest trades of our forefathers. In 
the detailed lists of the prominent directors and 
overseers of the Fustian, Cloth, Bay, and Serge 
Halls given by Jan Orlers, we read the names of 
the employers of the Pilgrim fathers. In those 



"A FAIR CITY '' — LEYDEN 89 

days tlie only way to make a living within a 
walled city was by some handicraft. If these 
English folk had gone out into the country to 
work on farms, they would have been compelled 
to scatter, whereas their vital need and great pur- 
pose required them to keep together. 

Bradford says that they put their hands to 
such trades and employments as they best could, 
and that many of them became baize and serge 
weavers, others wool - carders, spinners, wool- 
combers, hat-makers, rope-makers, twine-twisters, 
masons and carpenters, block-makers, cabinet- 
makers, stocking-weavers, brewers, bakers, tail- 
ors, and pipe-makers. The old Dutch books on 
" Bezigheiden," or occupations, with their spirited 
woodcuts drawn from life, show exactly how the 
laborers, mechanics, and professional men dressed, 
lived, and worked in this industrial era. The 
industrial situation was then just as I have seen 
it in Japan, — the finest and costliest products 
of the bookbinders, potters, lapidaries, weavers, 
and metal-workers were wrought in small shops, 
the vats, the wheels, the furnaces, or the looms 
being usually in the owner's or worker's own 
dwelling. Even in printing and publishing, the 
typesetter or compositor often worked in his own 
house and carried his forms, when filled, to the 
pressman to have his sheets printed. 

Leyden was not so large then as some people 
think it was, that is, with " one hundred thou- 



90 "A FAIR CITY'' — LEYBEN 

sand " people, — which it almost certainly never 
had. To-day the city has about forty thousand 
inhabitants, and is still noted for its blankets, 
woolen goods, and various other manufactures, 
as the catalogue of the great exhibition of Ley- 
den products held in 1889 shows. Indeed, as 
the old tax lists prove, Leyden probably never 
had much more than fifty thousand permanent 
residents. No city in all the world is so rich in 
memorials of the Pilgrims as this " Venice of the 
North." Certainly none is more interesting to 
the American of catholic appreciation and unsec- 
tional tastes, who knows how to find his way 
around and how to get at the records, which bear 
witness to the loves, the industries, the troubles, 
and the triumphs of the Pilgrims. 

Leyden gets its name from the old Celtic word 
" Lugdun," which means the looking place, or out- 
look, referring to the great mound or burg placed 
anciently at the junction of the two branches of 
the Hhine to command both waterways. Though 
lying on low land, Leyden's name and situation 
are like that of the hill city of Lyons in France, 
which has in its name the same root-word, lug^ 
and this is no other than that in our word " look." 
Before the Romans lengthened the local term 
to Lugdunum, or even the Teutonic tribes had 
come into the land, there were human habitations 
here. When the helmets of the legionaries 
flashed in the northern sunlisht and written Ian- 



"^ FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 91 

guage told of this place, it was called Lugdunum 
Batavorum, or the Outlook of the Batavians. 
What is now the Breede Straat, or Broadway, 
was once the Roman road laid out on the old 
Celtic footpath and horse track which led to the 
seashore. 

As excavations and researches to-day show, 
the Romans built their fortress on the old Celtic 
foundation of " the Burg," in the centre of the 
city, and also dug the Vliet, or Fleet, which is 
still part of the water system of Leyden. When, 
after five centuries of occupation, the Romans 
were driven back and out of the land, the Ger- 
manic peoples came again and once more rebuilt 
the fortress on top of the two lower foundations, 
Celtic and Roman, and began here their city on 
the forked Rhine. These were the " Anglo-Sax- 
ons." The Angles or Engels, from which England 
and the English get their name, must have lived 
a good while in Holland, for there are nearly fifty 
places in the Dutch kingdom to-day named 
" Engeland," or England, with associated names 
meaning the " English " hill, court, or landmark 
of some kind. The Saxons also passed through 
the land on their way to the British Isles. It 
may even be that one half of the immigrants into 
Britain called " Anglo-Saxons " were Frisians. 
The Pilgrims in sailing eastward to the older 
home-land were in the track of one line of their 
forefathers. They were reversing history, but 



92 "4 FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 

only long enough to store up and unite their 
forces for a longer voyage and a third home. 

It is more than probable that the educated 
men of the party, who had often worshiped in or 
lived under the shadow of St. Wilfrid's church 
at Scrooby, recognized the image of this saint so 
common in Dutch literature and sculpture, and 
so prominent on or in the Catholic church edifices 
of the Netherlands. Vlissingen takes its name 
from Wilfrid's water-flask or bottle, long kept 
there as a relic. 

When the Counts of Holland, which was the 
name of the holt land or well-wooded region 
along the lower Rhine, built their castle at Ley- 
den, the city became rich and famous for its mar- 
kets and trade, and especially for its woolen 
products. Its guilds of mechanics and skilled 
workers were known throughout Europe. Al- 
ready, in the Middle Ages, the city was noted for 
its splendid churches, for its hospitals; its orphan 
asylums, and its schools, where the poor received 
instruction free of charge, the schools being sup- 
ported by public taxation. Jan Orlers's pages 
show that the most honorable and learned men 
in Leyden were among the directors and inspec- 
tors of these schools. 

The original ancient city lay between the 
Rapenburg Gracht and the Rhine. In this most 
famous and oldest part stands the cathedral, or 
St. Peter's Church, dedicated in 1121 and enlarged 



"A FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 93 

in 1339. Its superb spire, once a landmark 
beheld far out at sea, fell in 1512. Running 
alongside and named after its belfry, there was, 
and still is, the Klok Steeg, or Bell Alley, in 
which the Pilgrims afterwards lived. Facing the 
Rapenburg is the nunnery building, with its beau- 
tiful grounds, which afterwards became the pro- 
perty of the university. On Broadway, the main 
thoroughfare of the city, was the City Hall, 
where so many of the Pilgrim youth and maidens 
went to declare their intentions of marriage. In 
this neighborhood are also the university library 
— in which Robinson sj^ent many hours of enjoy- 
ment — and the present museum of antiquities. 
On the broad quays fronting the Rhine River and 
convenient to the boats were then, and still are, 
the six markets for timber, flowers, eels, sea-fish, 
vegetables, and butter. In short, this is still to 
the visitor the most interesting part of the city. 
Not a few things in American life, especially life 
in the Middle States, take their origin or prece- 
dent from Leyden. 

In the year 1200 there was an enlargement of 
the city made by the addition of that portion of 
land between the Heeren Gracht and the Burg:. 
Four other enlargements, the last in 1659, were 
made, and each was inclosed with walls and moats. 
It is the fourth increase, that made in 1610, which 
most interests us, because it was here, on the new 
and cheap lands, that the Pilgrims settled. In 



94 "yl FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 

view of the Great Truce then completed, and the 
prospect of at least twelve years of peace and un- 
disturbed business, the city magistrates and land 
speculators felt justified in laying out this new 
part of Leyden. This portion runs from the 
Heeren Gracht westward to Boerhave Street and 
the Plantage, or garden. On the southern side, 
facing the wide Vest Gracht, are the potato and 
the beast markets. 

The very interesting building called the Laken- 
hal, or Cloth Hall, although not built until after 
the Pilgrims had left the city, is very stimulating 
to the imagination of the student, because on the 
outside are beautiful bas-reliefs showing all the 
various stages through which a piece of cloth, 
made in the days before steam machinery, passed, 
from the sheejj's back until, as an attractively 
folded, wrapped, approved, and stamped package, 
it came into the hands of the cutter and tailor. 
To-day the old tubs, benches, looms, scissors, 
tools, stamps, and certificates are only curiosities. 
Steam, the child born of water and fire, has 
wrought a revolution in the methods of the cloth 
trade and the weaver's art. 

Yet besides these relics of industry, there are 
other memorials within the edifice of a more gen- 
eral and fascinating nature, which touch the im- 
agination, and in them one may read Leyden's 
history. Old Roman fossils and remains, curious 
old mediaeval ornaments and tools, cannon-balls, 



"A FAIR CITY '' — LEYDEN 95 

arrow-shafts and bolts shot by the bow-gun, frag- 
ments of old catapults, dented helmets and armor, 
war-clubs, all kinds of tools for stabbing, cutting, 
and killing, besides jewelry and fashionable finery, 
and household furnishings, illustrate Leyden life 
in all its phases. More interesting than anything 
else are the reminders of the famous siege, espe- 
cially the metal cooking-pot, duly inscribed, in 
which the hungry but panic-stricken Spaniards 
left their hodge-podge — a stew made of meat 
and vegetables — smoking hot in their fort, near- 
est the city walls, which they were obliged to 
evacuate before the Zealand " Water Beggars " 
on the night of October 2, 1573. Near by hangs 
a great silken banner upon which is painted the 
figure of the suffering Christ, captured from a 
vessel in the Spanish Armada. The streaming 
rays of glory in the nimbus over his head, long 
faded and still invisible to the. naked eye, have 
come to resurrection in the photograj^h. 

These relics of the siege and war of independ- 
ence here gathered together were formerly in the 
City Hall, which on all public holidays was thrown 
open to the public. Undoubtedly the Pilgrim 
boys and girls looked with wonder and delight on 
these emblems of victory when they were new 
and fresh, and on the old paintings of Lucas van 
Leyden and Engelbrechtsze which Rembrandt 
studied, and which shed lustre on the city. Of 
the buildings older than the Cloth Hall, such as 



96 "A FAIR CITY'' — LEYDEN 

the Natural History. Museum and the Univei-slLy 
Library, besides the Botanic Gardens, we have 
good contemporary pictures by Professor Swannen- 
burch, who was also a school director. These en- 
gravings show many specimens of bird, beast, fish, 
and the curious things in the mineral, vegetable, 
and animal worlds, just as they were arranged in 
Pilgrim times. In the library we see that the 
readers, in high peaked hats and cloaks, stood 
at desks, while reading, and that the books were 
chained or held by rods. The inevitable pet dog 
is there also. This was the city of Rembrandt's 
boyhood. The miller's lad, who was destined to 
be the world's greatest master of light and shade 
on canvas, played in the same streets that were 
familiar to the Pilgrim boys and girls. 



CHAPTER IX 

LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

By the end of the first year, 1609, it is quite 
probable that all the men and older boys and 
girls of the Pilgrim church company who wanted 
to get work at various trades and occupations out- 
side of their own homes, had been able to do so ; 
for Leyden at this very time was in a high state 
of prosperity. Employment was quite easy to 
obtain, though perhaps only a few of Kobinson's 
company were skilled craftsmen. Even before 
they arrived, there were many people from the 
British Isles already living in Leyden. Most of 
these, who were neither students nor military 
men, were engaged in some kind of business or 
manual occupation connected with the making of 
woolen goods. As we can see from the Dutch 
records, these foreigners in Holland came princi- 
pally from southern and eastern England, though 
a few were from the western and northern coun- 
ties, and some also from Scotland and Ireland. 
In the list of twenty-four British citizens in Ley- 
den from 1603 to 1608, five were Scotchmen, one 
was an Irishman, but nearly all of them were 
woolen-workers. The various books in the Ley- 



98 LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

den archives which contain records of the Pilgrims 
are the book of burghers or citizens, the lists of 
those paying poll tax, the registries of deeds and 
securities, the university records, and the book of 
burials. 

The greatest number of Pilgrim names is found 
in the Trouw, or Troth Book, and are those of 
persons declaring intentions of marriage, who 
came with their witnesses or sureties. While in 
Leyden, as is quite certain, the Pilgrims were in 
the main a happy and a healthy company, and 
the majority of them enjoyed life richly. So 
early as December 4, 1610, we find in the Trouw, 
or Betrothal Book, on page 162, that " William 
Pantes," a fustian-worker, come out of England 
from " Marendorf," near Dover, appeared with 
his witnesses, " William Bruwster, Rogier Wil- 
son, and Eduwaert Sutwaert," to give notice of 
his marriage with " Wibre Hanson," a young 
maid out of England who appeared with three 
friends, "Janneken White, Anna Poller, and 
Maryt Bottaer." 

One can easily recognize the true English form 
of these names in their Dutch caricatures. In 
later history we find that Mr. and Mrs. William 
Pantes did not go to America, because when 
their opportunity came they were probably too 
old. The good wife of 1610 is found in the mid- 
summer of 1611 coming as voucher for Margaret 
Oldham, a maiden from England, who married 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 99 

W'illem Berset (William Basset), of Sandwich, 
the widower of Sisle Lecht (Cecil (?) Lecht). 
Basset, whose name is the fourth to declare in- 
tentions, was to have married " Mayke Botler " 
(Mary Butler), of Norwich, but " De bruid is 
gestorven bij het derde gebod," that is, the bride 
died before the third publication of the banns. 
However, Basset soon found a new bride, for 
whom Wybre Pantes vouched, and Mr. and Mrs. 
Basset went in due time to Plymouth. 

We can imagine these little parties coming over 
out of Belfry Lane into the Broad Street. They 
go up the steps of that same City Hall which we 
still see, and into the room of the registry. There 
they give their names, which we read in the once 
white vellum-bound books, now yellowish with age. 
They are written in the best manner possible, after 
filtering through a Dutch ear, and reappearing in 
the spelling of a Dutch clerk, I confess that, 
in looking over the Leyden records, considerable 
study was required in some cases to discover the 
English originals, so strangely transmuted in 
their Dutch orthography. Yet I can assure the 
reader that Dutch names in England have fared 
equally hard. There are thousands of genuine 
Netherlandish names, especially in the eastern 
and the southern counties, and in New as well as 
in Old England, which in the records look, read, 
and sound as if pure English. 

To-day thousands of people having in their 

LOFC 



100 LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

veins what tliey believe to be " the bluest of 
English blood " bear not only Dutch names in an 
altered form, but have plenty of Dutch ancestral 
blood in their arteries. Even in the Pilgrim 
company and Plymouth Colony the names of 
Dutch men and women and of the numerous 
French folk as well, are anglicized beyond the 
recognition of an ordinary Hollander, such as 
" Simmons " for Symonson, " Cuthbert Cuthbert- 
son " for Godbert Godbertson, and " Mullins " 
for Molines, or Molineaux. Other names on the 
tongues of speakers of English suffered surprising 
changes. Bompasse was compressed into Bump, 
La Douce into Dewson, and de la Noye into 
Delano. The prefix " de " in nearly all the Neth- 
erland or French names has melted into the main 
word, as seen in scores of instances, such as 
D' Albert, D'Anvers, De Haan, De Hahm, which 
have become Dolbeare, Dan vers or Denver, Dann, 
Damm or Deems, respectively. 

Still further, while we may think the Dutch- 
men queer fellows, thus to play pranks with the 
already unsettled orthography of English names, 
we must remember that the English language, as 
it sounded on the tongues of these rustic folk 
from the back country of North England, was 
not precisely the same as that heard in London's 
West End in our day. When, again, we consider 
the varying values of consonants and vowels in 
our patchwork alphabet, — which we inherit as 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 101 

the cast-off garments wliich Hebrews, Phoeni- 
cians, Greeks, and Eomans have used before us, 
— there is no mystery about the grotesque forms 
in the Leyden and Amsterdam records. In many 
cases it is not at all certain that the intending 
brides and bridegrooms of the Pilgrim company 
could have written or spelled their own names 
even so well as did the Dutch functionaries of 
the goose-quill. Like numerous lords and ladies 
in the Europe of that day, some of the Pilgrim 
fathers and mothers could not write their own 
names, nor was this any disgrace then. 

Any authorized person, civil or clerical, who 
has joined in marriage many score couples, native 
and foreign, and written out licenses or made reg- 
istration of vital statistics will easily understand 
this. I know from experience that the correct 
recording of the names of shy or embarrassed 
young people, who have had need but rarely to 
pronounce their full and formal names to a 
stranger, is very difficult. Again, the whole mat- 
ter of spelling, either in Dutch or English, is 
even now hardly under the domain of law. In 
the sixteenth century the situation was that of 
anarchy. In his history, Bradford spells the 
same word in six or seven different ways, and 
men more learned than he often twisted even a 
well-known proper name " nine ways out of 
shape." In most old English documents, one 
can discover so many varieties of cacography as 



102 LOVE, COUBTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

a postmaster can collect in one of our American 
towns of Indian or classic name, such as Omalia 
or Romulus. Even of Ithaca — a name that has 
been in written language, polished speech, and 
classic editions during three thousand years — 
over twenty-five variations have been noted, and 
many educated people give two dotted vowels to 
the name of the city associated with the one-eyed 
Cyclops. 

Nor do we imagine that the majority of young 
people of Belfry Lane, with slight thought for 
posterity and no dream of history, cared much 
more than a fia,' how the Dutchmen wrote their 
names. These, pronounced hastily and awk- 
wardly, their true spelling often perhaps unknown 
to their owners, who rarely saw them in writing, 
were hard enough for a Dutch ear to catch. Of 
seven Pilgrim leaders, the birthplaces of only four 
are known, and of two only has the baptismal 
record been found, in England. AVhat is true 
of the leaders is at least equally so of the rank 
and file. 

Coming down from the Stad-IIuis, due pro- 
clamation of the banns by the city clerk would 
follow, exactly as I have seen them read in Hol- 
land and Friesland. The young folk would be 
married by civil process, and then would follow 
the marriage feast, with plenty of innocent gayety, 
jest, and mirth, despite the fact that they were 
genuine Puritans. 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 103 

To continue the story of love and marriage, we 
find that on the 30th of December, 1610, John 
Jennings, a fustian-worker from Colchester, in 
England, never before married, and accompanied 
by Roger Williams and Edward Southworth, both 
of whom vouched for him, came with Elizabeth 
Pettenger, never before married, out of England, 
who had as vouchers Anna Has and Janneken 
Peck. This betrothal does not seem to have 
ripened into marriage, for no further record of 
banns is given, but we find Elizabeth coming on 
November 20, 1613, to vouch for her sister Doro- 
thea, who is to wed the widower Henry CruUins, 
of Amsterdam. 

There were no more weddings apparently until 
April and May, 1611 ; but from that time forth 
are the registrations of no fewer than about fifty 
marriages, which in ten years is a pretty fair 
record for a church company never at any one 
time numbering over probably three hundred 
communicants. Puritanism never hindered love, 
but purified it. The Song of Songs declares that 
love is a fire of God. These folk from Merrie 
England no doubt had many pleasant though 
modest wedding festivals. 

Not all the Separatists lived on the Rhine. 
We find the future governor, William Bradford, 
in Amsterdam November 9, 1613. He has come 
to declare his intentions to wed Dorothy May, 
who signs herself " Dority," thus leaving on the 



104 LOVE, COUBTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

city records her only known sign-manual. Theirs 
is " a tale of two cities." Like Moses, she was 
destined to see a promised land, yet not enter it, 
for after seven years of married life she was 
drowned from the Mayflower off Cape Cod. 
Young men from Leyden went to the cities on 
the Amstel and Rotte to marry English or Dutch 
girls. Others came from various states of the 
republic to the city of St. Peter's Keys on the 
Rhine to do their courting, to woo, and to win. 
The rosy-cheeked lads and lassies from England 
did not confine themselves to their own nation, 
but married freely among the men and maids of 
the land. 

Indeed, one of the causes which finally decided 
the leaders to cross the sea was the fact that, as 
a company, they were being gradually merged 
into the Dutch people, through marriage of their 
sons and daughters, as well as by the enlistment 
of the young men in the Dutch armj^ navy, and 
mercantile marine. There was danger of their 
tiny ark being swamped in the Dutch ocean. 

To resume our list, we find that Degory Priest 
had for his witnesses William Leslie and Samuel 
Fuller, Here are the names of Isaac AUerton 
and Edward Southworth, of Bridget Robinson 
and Sarah Priest, of Thomas Morton and Alex- 
ander Carpenter, appearing as witnesses. Again, 
Samuel Fuller appears as a widower. Jacob 
Mekancke, who is a " hand-shoe " or glove maker 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MABEIAGE 105 

from Scotland, marries an English maid. By 
November 20, 1613, we find that Henry Collins, 
a bombazine-maker from England, living in Am- 
sterdam, has come down to Leyden to get mar- 
ried. He brings to the City Hall as his voucher 
the Leyden lover who has himself been wooing 
in the metropolis. This is William Bradford, 
who becomes a husband ten days later. It is 
written in Leyden tliat on the 8th of November, 
1613, William " Kadfort," a fustian-worker, " van 
Oosterfeldt in Englandt," has given notice of 
his engagement to " Dorothea May, van Witz- 
buts, in Engelandt." The two were made one in 
the northern city on the 30tli of November. It 
is quite evident that on that day either the Dutch 
clerk must have been an old fellow who could 
not hear very well, or Bradford did not speak 
up clearly, for after the absurd " Kadfort " the 
Dutchman has put in parentheses, " Badfort or 
Hadfort." Yet this is none other than our first 
American historian, William Bradford, who per- 
haps did not roll his r like the later dwellers in 
the land of the east wind. Dorothy May was 
from Wisbeach, in Lincolnshire, which is very 
rich in Dutch names and blood, and after her 
name (which was a common Dutch as well as 
English one, as we see in Cape May, for example) 
the clerk wrote, " has not appeared but has deliv- 
ered an attestation." In the next notice of banns 
and marriage, Bradford appears with Moses 



106 LOVE, COURTSUIP, AND MARRIAGE 

Fletcher, widower of Maria Evans, who is going 
to marry Sarah Dinbay, the widow of William 
Dinbay. 

Most of the males who thus far had come to 
get married were makers of baize or serge or 
gloves or shoes, but on September 5, 1614, we 
meet on the written page with one who is a 
" boy," " Jehan Jene " (John Jenney) from Nor- 
wich, England, living at Rotterdam, and working 
in a brewery, who has found in Leyden her who 
in his eyes is the fairest among women, " Sara 
Kaire " (Sarah Carey), a maid from " Mouck- 
soom." On the 22d of May, 1615, Roger Chan- 
dler, whose name is spelled (and from a Dutch 
point of view most properly) Kandelaer, from 
Colchester, marries a maid Isabel from Canter- 
bury ; which, as it stands on the records, is 
" Cantelberch." We see how the Dutch "burg" 
becomes in English "bury," "borough," "burgh," 
or " burg," and how the k in " kerk " or " Kande- 
laer " becomes ch, as in " church " and " Chandler." 

In July, 1615, Samuel Butler, whose name 
appears as Boetlaer, and who was a " koopman " 
(in English cheaj^-man or chapman, meaning a 
merchant, while a partner is a coop-mate), brings 
for his vouchers Samuel Fuller, the doctor, and 
William Jepson, the carpenter, of whom we shall 
hear again. When Edmond Jesep (or Jepson, 
as the Dutch clerk adds), a bombazine-worker, 
comes to declare his love for Abigail Hunt, who 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 107 

is an unmarried girl from France, but who came 
from England, the clerk adds that he lives in the 
Greenport over the Belfry. 

There was a good deal of known Dutch blood 
infused into the Leyden and Plymouth company, 
before all the immigrant ships from Delfshaven 
had crossed the Atlantic. The names of " Nelken 
Kaerlil," a young maid " out of Holland in Eng- 
land," with " Anneke Has," her sister, may not 
have been Dutch ; but Elizabeth Willincks, who 
wedded Roger Wilson, had a Dutch name. On 
the 17th of April, 1616, we find that Robert 
Lamkin appeared with his intending brother-in- 
law, as his only witness or voucher, to marry 
Miss Jacob Mijntje Jueosar de Graef, who is a 
fair maid of Leyden. She bears a family name 
famous in science and politics. The physician 
who discovered the Graafian vesicle, and the gov- 
ernor of the West India Island of St. Eustatius, 
who fired the first salute to the American flag- 
having stars as well as stripes, — to mention no 
others, — bore that name. On May 13, 1616, 
Mr. Heraut Wilson, the pump-maker, entered the 
City Hall, in company with William Jepson and 
John Carver, to marry Elizabeth Claes, from 
" Sermuyde," of England, whose vouchers were 
Sarah Minther and Dorothy Bradford, wife of 
William, or so at least do we understand the 
Dutch of " Derreke Bretfort." 

Other spellings of English names are suffi- 



108 LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

ciently amusing. Zachariah Burr becomes " Sa- 
carius Boore," Cushman becomes " Coetsman," 
the said Robert Cushman declaring his intentions, 
19th of May, 1617, and marrying, on the 3d of 
June, Mary Singleton, whose name appears as 
" Chingelton." 

Most naturally the Dutch clerks in spelling- 
names reverted, as it were, from Lowest Dutch 
or English, to Piatt, or Middle Dutch, which is 
HoUandish, German being High Dutch. Hence, 
we find not only Osterfeldt for Austerfield, but 
Stephen Butterfield's name as Butterfelt. He 
was a silk-worker. 

Up to the 3'ear 1617 the trades of the young 
men marrying, are, in monotonous succession, 
those connected with the products of the sheep, 
but thereafter we find men who had every day to 
handle black pads and type, and wash printer's 
ink off their fingers. There was a good deal of 
typesetting and presswork done in Leyden, where 
stood the great Elzevir house, whose books are 
famous all over the world, and whose printing is 
in quality hardly excelled to-day. 

It is quite probable that some of the journey- 
men printers in the Pilgrim company were at 
work in this establishment. Among other books 
on the press in 1617 was the folio volume of Pro- 
fessor Ubbo Emmius of Gi'oningen, who tells us 
so minutely about local government in the towns 
of democratic Frieslaud. There, with prayer, 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 109 

ballot-box, and a written ballot, magistrates were 
chosen. Lands were divided and held in common, 
and things were done generally in very much the 
same way that the Pilgrim Fathers afterward set 
them going in New Plymouth. 

Wherever printers go Cupid follows. We read, 
in the first mention of a printer among the Pil- 
grims, that on the 28th of July, 1617, " Jan Rey- 
nouts" (John Reynolds), who is a young "gesel" 
from London, is going to marry Prudence Grin- 
don, a young daughter and maid from England, 
whose avouching companions are Maria Brewster 
and Mary Allerton. Passing over other names, 
we come to another printer, Edward Wiuslow, a 
young man from London who, on April 27, 1618, 
declared his intentions of marrying Elizabeth 
Barker, which he did on the 17tli of May, 1618, 
her place of origin being " Chatsiim ; " but whether 
this be meant for Chester or for Cadzand, we can- 
not tell. The next record is that of Samuel Lee, 
a hat-maker. The next is a brick-maker, Roger 
Simons, who hails from Sarum, but dwells in 
Amsterdam. He has come down to Leyden to 
mai"ry Sarah Minther, the widow of William 
Minther, she appearing with her father and mo- 
ther as vouchers. Again, John Smith, a widower, 
marries " Elsgen Knets." 

In September, 1619, we find that John Cod- 
more, a widower, whose trade is that of linen- 
weaver, is to marry the maid Sarah Hooper. 



110 LOVE, COUETSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 

Here, as in so many other places, we learn that 
certain men and women of the church company 
were more frequently at the City Hall acting as 
match-makers, — using the word in a good sense, 
— or witnesses, than others. This may have been 
not only because of their respectability, character, 
and station, but also, as is very lYrobable, because 
of their geniality and willingness to help young 
people put their necks into the matrimonial yoke. 
The last record that we find, before the first com- 
pany or advanced guard of the young and strong 
went off in the Speedwell to England, is of 
Leonard Dunster, a silk-worker. As the Dutch 
record tells us, he came with his prospective 
father-in-law, while his betrothed, " Maycken 
Bruynes," a young maid from Colchester, Eng- 
land, is accompanied by " Mayken Sullenders," 
her mother, who may have been twice a widow, 
for evidently there is a step-parent in the case. 

Two or three days after the Mayflower com- 
pany had stepped ashore at Plymouth, record was 
made of Stephen Tracy, who was evidently, as we 
judge from the name, like Samuel Terry, Hester 
Cooke, the Mullins family, Edward Burcher, An- 
thony Dix, Mrs. Tracy, and others, of Huguenot, 
or Walloon, birth or descent. Tracy was the last 
of the forefathers who went to America who can 
be traced on the list at the City Hall. He 
married " Tryfoce [Triphosa] Le ." Evi- 
dently the Dutch clerk did not catch the other 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 111 

name, but what odds? Certainly there was no 
hindrance, for they were married on January 2, 
1621. Evidently she also was a Walloon, as the 
pi-efix " Le " shows. Still further in the City 
Hall list down to 1630, we meet with over a 
score of records of the betrothal and marriage of 
British wool-combers and hat-makers, and workers 
in serge, baize, cloth, and bombazine, — for Laud 
was impoverishing England to enrich Holland, 
driving out the Nonconformists, — but on the 
10th of May, 1629, we find '' John Grynwith," 
who was a student in theology and probably the 
same as John Grinwodus (Greenwood), of the 
Leyden University entrance record of July 9, 
1625. After courtship and graduation, he re- 
turned to marry Bridget Robinson, daughter of 
the pastor, who came with her mother as a wit- 
ness. Bridget was then a common name among 
English women. Cromwell addressed not a few 
of his letters to his wife, " Dear Biddy." 

We find that our friend " Jan Reynouts," 
the printer, having become a widower, went up 
to Amsterdam, where he found a new wife, 
Persis Baly, who was living by the Beurse 
(Bourse) or Exchange at Amsterdam. The 
last of the records is that of Thomas Philips, 
a serge-worker from Norwich, who married 
Susannah Siers, from Sandwich, England, on 
July 25, 1630. All these dates, we must remem- 
ber, were in the new, or modern style, while 



112 LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MAERIAGE 

English dates of tliat period were like those of 
Russia in our times, — ten days beyond the rest 
of the civilized world. The Dutch, though 
stern Protestants, did not hesitate to be in the 
van of science even though the calendar had been 
made by the Pope. 

This church company of men and women, who, 
because of the union of politics and religion, had 
been uprooted from their homes and driven from 
their native land, arrived in a covmtry where, 
in all its history of many centuries, the fires of 
man's master passions were never hotter. The 
struggle between caste, privilege, and monarchy 
in religion, led by Spain on the one hand, and 
democracy in state and church, led by Holland 
and Zealand on the other, had been going on for 
forty years. Because in substance victory had 
been already won, the English refugees had rest 
and time for growth. Among themselves the 
great dominating, overmastering, organizing, and 
unifying idea was that of religion, but politics 
were not forgotten. They hoped to see a purified 
church, and they prepared also to establish " the 
republic of God." Yet as we have seen, the 
business of love went on industriously, and just 
so soon as bread was provided, there were mar- 
riages many and in continuance. 

Necessarily the Leyden records preserve only 
a portion of the names of those who were mar- 
ried out of the church company in Belfry Lane. 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 113 

The names of those daughters and sons who went 
elsewhere in the republic than to Rotterdam and 
Amsterdam to wed Dutch, English, or French 
yoke-fellows, as well as the names of the young 
men who enlisted in the Dutch army and navy to 
fight the Spaniards, or who went on voyages of 
discovery, exploration, or trade will probably 
never come into the realm of the known. Still 
less are we likely to recover the names of those 
who, not liking the strict ways of the Leyden 
Pilgrims, went back to England, or, settling 
among the Dutch, lived what seemed to them 
more reasonable and pleasant lives. In Amster- 
dam, as Dr. Scheffer has found, there were one 
hundred and eighteen marriages among these 
English exiles from twenty-nine counties, between 
1598 and 1617. 

One of these Englishmen in the Netherlands, 
named John Starter, though we are not certain 
that he was a Separatist, became a famous poet 
and singer in Friesland. He lived a gay and 
luxurious life, and has left behind him many 
sweet and stirring songs and amorous and humor- 
ous poems in elegant Dutch, thus making income 
and fame. His works are still reprinted in fine 
editions. 

There do not, so far as we can see, appear to 
have been many intermarriages of these plain 
English Separatists, most of them mechanics and 
country people, with the other British people in 



114 LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARBIAGE 

the cliurcli next door to them, under the pastorate 
of the Rev, Robert Durie, whose salary was paid 
by the city of Leyden, or with the other English 
churches, of which eight or ten of the whole num- 
ber of twenty-six or thirty known in the seven- 
teenth century, were then in the Netherlands 
before 1620. The Separatists made unions for 
life more commonly with the Walloons and Dutch 
than with the English or Scottish people of the 
state churches of Great Britaiu. 

While the Pilgrims were in Holland, the Book 
of Common Prayer was translated into Dutch. 
There were many marriages of English and Scot- 
tish soldiers with Dutch women. 

Three Pilgrim men were especially interested 
in local and practical politics. They were Wil- 
liam Bradford, Isaac Allerton, and Degory Priest. 
The future governor was the first to avail him- 
self of the privileges of citizenship in Leyden, 
his registration as freeman having been made 
March 30, 1612, Roger Wilson and William 
Lysle being his securities. Roger Wilson did 
not come to America, but seems to have been 
otherwise a prominent man in the company, for 
on February 7, 1614, he became security for Isaac 
Allerton, and on November 16, 1615, for Degory 
Priest, the hatter. These men would thus, by be- 
coming citizens of Leyden, and j)ersonally and 
practicall}^ enjoying its privileges, learn the work- 
ing of municipal government and ward organiza- 



LOVE, COURTSHIP, AND MARRIAGE 115 

tion, and be interested in the movements of poli- 
tics in a municipal and federal republic. 

Political procedure in the Low Countries was 
considerably different from that in England ; and 
though republicanism was then in a very imper- 
fect condition, yet it was in spirit and often in 
form like that of the later government in the 
United States of America. With the living 
example of a federal reiJublic before them, and 
in a country which counted as one of its States 
Friesland, where the tastes and methods of the 
people were of the most democratic kind, the 
Pilo'rims could not but learn much that fitted 
them to be builders of a new commonwealth. In 
Friesland, local government was still the general 
rule. There the old Teutonic ideas, of the town, 
with the rights of pasture, woodland and water 
held in common, were still kept up. Instead of 
being comparatively dead traditions, as in Eng- 
land, these were working and effective. Many of 
these Dutch ideas have gone into the law, espe- 
cially of the Middle States, notably of New York 
and Pennsylvania. 

There was no absolute liberty at that time any- 
where in Europe, yet throughout the Dutch repub- 
lic there was an atmosphere of wonderful freedom 
of speech and of the press, and in the Dutch 
churches there was a democracy which compelled 
the more aristocratic city and state governments 
to execute the popular will. In later centuries 



116 LOVE, counrsuip, and marriage 

the American people, in the evolution of their 
destiny and confronted by the problems of federal 
politics, borrowed ideas, laws, constitutional prin- 
ciples, and even pet phrases, approved standard 
methods, and party names, from the republic in 
which the Pilgrims found asylum and education. 



\ 



CHAPTER X 

WORK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

How many children were born in the Leyden 
church company between 1610 and 1620 ? How 
many lived and grew up among Dutch playmates 
and learned their speech? It is very probable 
that not a few of the Pilgrim children went to the 
Dutch free public schools, where they acquired 
the rudiments of education in the sister language 
which is nearest to English. We may judge that 
at least twenty children came first to Leyden in 
1610, and that about one hundred were born or 
lived a longer or shorter space in Holland and 
became familiar with Dutch things and ideas. 

Leyden, from the early Middle Ages, as her 
archives still show, had a noble story of popular, 
as well as of special education. Besides the 
Dutch public schools, there was also one for 
the Walloons in Leyden. From these records, 
the contemporaneous paintings, and the little 
book entitled " A Peep into the Old School 
World," published in Leyden in 1890, when a 
great exhibition of the antiquities, as well as of 
the modern improvements in Dutch national edu- 
cation was held, we can form a clear idea of the 



118 WOEK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

comparative excellence of instruction in the ele- 
mentary public schools, which were fi-ee to the 
poor. 

A proportion of the Pilgrim company became 
coop-mates, — to use the old English word, — or 
partners with the natives, their fellow workmen. 
Living while at work in every-day association 
with Leyden peoj)le, they must have learned to 
think and talk in Dutch. Especially the younger 
and more intelligent portions must have so ac- 
quired the language as to use it fluently and well. 
Bradford, Winslow, and others, as we know, were 
able to write Dutch. In the library of the Pil- 
grims' own writings, there is frequent mention of 
" our members that understood the [Dutch] lan- 
guage." 

No doubt this noble speech of a free peojjle 
sounded, as it still does to all who first hear 
it and do not know it, " uncouth." The Dutch 
is not a dialect of German. It is a language by 
itself, and is one of the strongest, clearest, and 
best fitted to express high ideas and to resist the 
intrusion of foreign elements. The speech of 
Erasmus, Grotius and Voudel is as different 
from that of Luther, Goethe, and Schiller as 
English is different from Dutch. When the Sep- 
aratists arrived in the Netherlands the Dutch lan- 
guage had already been cultivated and adorned 
by the writings of a host of poets, prose- writers, 
scholars, dramatists, jurists, and men of science. 



WOEK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 119 

It had even been made the subject of critical re- 
search, being- one of the first languages in Europe 
to be so treated, for Killian was one of the fore- 
most pioneers in modern linguistic science. 

Scholarly English-speaking students of Dutch 
know that the likeness between the two languages 
spoken on opposite sides of the North Sea is very 
close, and that Dutch is especially the repository 
of the old and dear and hallowed words in Eng- 
lish speech and literature. It must not be for- 
gotten that the later British prejudices against 
their neighbors, which arose out of commercial 
jealousy and the wars of Cromwell and Stuart 
days, were unknown to the Pilgrims, as well as 
to most Englishmen before A. D. 1630. 

The children, besides easily picking up a new 
language with far more rapidity than adults, see 
a thousand things which their elders do not notice. 
As a rule, a child's range of observation is of 
things not higher than the top of a yardstick. 
A five-year old boy notices what is close at hand 
or on the ground. He has keen impressions of 
those things primitive and basic, to which a grown 
person is often numb or callous. He easily be- 
comes acquainted with animals. He likes the un- 
conventional and natural. In Leyden the elders 
might wrinkle their foreheads over the future 
and be sad with forebodings, but the children 
were happy. Despite the troubles of their par- 
ents, — hardship and toil, and at times poverty, 



120 WORK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

the uncertain future, the clangers from their sov- 
ereign to life, limb, and liberty, the wrestling with 
spiritual and social problems, — the young folk 
were happy, knowing as a rule nothing of the 
things unseen or unfelt. Leyden was at that time 
the heart of Holland ; and since it was one of the 
liveliest cities in Europe, life there must have 
been very delightful to the boys and girls. 

Beyond the walls, water-courses and flowery 
meadows lured them to angle or to stroll, and the 
seashore was only a few miles off. In winter 
skating, sleighing, sledding, and the merry games 
of the people made fun and frolic. 

Inside the city, they could go up on the Burg, 
and, looking over the country for miles around, 
have pointed out to them the historic sites made 
famous during the siege. Their Dutch friends, 
who had heard it from their fathers, could tell 
the story. Quite probably some of the older men 
and women, who had once suffered almost to 
starvation and it may be to wounds, were glad 
to fight once more the battle over again. Here 
rose a Spanish bastion. There such a body of 
troops camjDed. In this village the Spanish com- 
mander had his headquarters. Yonder the Ley- 
den boy, Gisbert Cornellison, in early morning 
waded out and found the fort of Lammen empty 
and the stew-pot (still kept as a precious relic) 
hung over the fire and full of " hutch-putch." 
As on a map, flat Holland lay before them. 



WORE AND PLAY IN LEYBEN 121 

They could see the fields which had been flooded 
by cutting the dikes at Delfshaven, the sluice- 
gates up to which the Zealand relief ships came, 
and the place where the sailors tossed up herring 
and loaves to the starving people. They would 
hear told many a wonderful tale and anecdote. 
The carrier pigeons which carried messages to 
and from friends outside, had been gratefully 
cared for and fed, and after their death were 
stuffed and kept as memorials. All Leyden was 
full of reminders, and scars, even then fresh, of 
the great siege, which had lasted one hundred and 
thirty-one days. 

Most popular and interesting of all the single 
festivals — for the Kermiss, or universal merry- 
making, lasted a week — was the annual Thanks- 
giving Day on October 3, when all the Dutch 
people of the city went to church to thank God 
for deliverance from the enemy and for his mer- 
cies, and then returned home to eat their favorite 
historic dish, — a stew of meat and vegetables, 
Spanish hodge-podge, or hutch-putch, as they 
called it, — in memory of their fathers. To this 
dish they added dainties and rich things for joy 
and gladness. Thus the Pilgrims had before 
them a living example, which they could never 
forget, of an annual Thanksgiving Day to God. 
Like equally sacred commemorative days in 
America and in all the world, perhaps, the mode 
of celebration became after a few irenerations less 



122 WORK AND PLAY IN LEY DEN 

rigidly religious. For those festivals handed 
down from the Roman form of Christianity the 
Pilgrims would have little sympathy and much 
antipathy ; but at the holidays of Santa Claus, 
or St. Nicholas (which is not the same as Christ- 
mas), New Year's Day, the Maypole festivities, 
the Kermiss, and the local and national rejoicings 
there is little doubt that many of the English 
folk rejoiced with their Dutch fellow-Christians 
of the Reformed faith. 

Jan Steen, born in 1626, and one of the world- 
renowned Leyden school of artists, has painted 
the joyous merriment in a Dutch liome on the 
day of Santa Claus, or St. Nicholas. Heaps 
of cookies, waffles, and sugar-loaves, and baskets 
of toys amuse the youngest of the children. 
One small boy plays with his father's cane. 
The daughter puts hay in the shoe to show the 
naughty older boy that he will get only that from 
Santa Claus. This unlucky urchin is making- 
such a wry face that he looks as if he had taken 
a pinch of snuff, but he is only crying. The 
windows, fireplace, curtained or closet bed, and 
the cozy comforts, of home life are pictured with 
spirit. They show scenes and surroundings fa- 
miliar especially to those members of the Separa- 
tist church who had social privileges above the 
average, and who were addressed as " Mr." and 
so wrote their names — a right and reservation 
now free to all. 




A DUTCH HOMK OX SANTA CLAUS MORNlNi; (DKCEMl'.ER 6) 



WOBK AND PLAY IN LEY DEN 123 

The young- people having that keen sense of 
the ludicrous, which no Puritanism can remove, 
and having- light sjDirits and few cares, must have 
enjoyed plenty of fun. That the young quite 
largely, and the adults moderately, at least, saw 
and appreciated the ludicrous side of Dutch life, 
may be surely believed. From what we learn 
from Bradford, who showed his wit in his letters, 
History, and Dialogue, the old deaconess had her 
hands full during church hours in keeping- the 
lively boys and girls in order. In the Dutch 
church the sermon always consisted of a prelude, 
or exordium remotum^ and an application ; while 
with Bible reading, psalm singing, and prayers 
and tuio collections, the services would be at least 
two hours long. In the Pilgrim house of worship 
the time would probably be no shorter, making it 
hard for juvenile flesh and blood to stand the 
tedium. The service in both tlie Dutch and the 
English churches was much the same, especially 
in length. 

Many famous visitors came to this city of 
learned men, and the people in Bell Alley could 
hear a good deal of English spoken on the streets 
by hundreds of English people, students, soldiers, 
merchants, contractors, and their families. These 
Pilgrim folk were not lonely, exce])t as they chose, 
for the sake of a high purpose and noble ideal, to 
make themselves so. 

The number of English-speaking students was 



124 WOBE AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

especially great after the universities of the home- 
land had been closed to the people of the four 
nations at large in the British Isles, and became 
accessible only to those of the one sect patronized 
by the state. In the list of students we find the 
name of Robert Durie, the minister of the Ensr- 
lish church which met in a house on the lot next 
to that of the Pilgrims. He matriculated in 1610. 
Being fifty-five years old and married, it is evi- 
dent that he and men like Robinson, who had 
wives and families, were what we should call spe- 
cial students ; for connection with the luiiversity 
gave one a position in the society of the city 
which was very desirable, and of which the Pil- 
grim leaders took rightful advantage. On Feb- 
ruary 7, 1615, Thomas Brewer, whose name was 
s]ielled " Braber," matriculated as a student of 
literature. On August 26, 1615, the Rev. John 
Robinson, then thirty-nine years old, entered as a 
stiulent of theology. 

While Durie is described as the minister of 
" the English church," which, by the way, was 
largely attended by Scottish people, nothing is 
said about Robinson's being the pastor of a 
church. The reason of this seems to me to be 
plain. All congregations that were professedly 
in conformity with the general doctrines and 
order of the Reformed faith in Europe, — among 
which the Church of England, as well as of Scot- 
land, was recognized as one, — were not only 



WORE AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 125 

acknowledged as churches by the Dutch magis- 
trates, but were furnished with jjlaces of worship, 
and the salaries of the ministers were paid in 
whole or in part at the cost of the city. Robin- 
son and his people, however, no more allowed or 
approved the regulation of the church by the ma- 
gistrates, than the Dutch recognized his company 
as a church, by giving him and them a church 
edifice or house of worship, whether they wanted 
it or not. Both parties left each other alone, and 
this beautifully and appropriately, with mutual 
satisfaction. Robinson's application from Am- 
sterdam for residence in Leyden, and the freedom 
of the city " in carrying on their trades without 
being a burden in the least to any one," dated 
February 12, 1609, shows the independent spirit 
of the Pilgrims. It contains no suggestion of 
asking for a house of worship from the authori- 
ties. Neither Robinson nor his people ever asked 
for a house of worship free, or for any pecuniary 
assistance in religious matters, for such a pro- 
ceeding would have been against their principles. 
They wanted only full toleration, and they got it. 
The university record, in Latin, states that Robin- 
son entered by permission of the magistrates, and 
that he had a family. 

Besides his literary and social privileges, a 
fellow of the university was free from patrol duty 
in time of war. He could buy or brew a certain 
amount of beer, or make wine for his private 



126 WOEK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

use free of excise tax. He also enjoyed freedom 
from arrest b}^ authorities other than those of the 
university. This immunity, which the British 
king vainly tried to ignore, prevented extradition 
to any foreign country at the whim of a sovereign. 
Membership in the university proved a tower of 
defense to Brewer and Brewster, and shielded 
them from the clutch of James Stuart and his 
henchman, Laud, when these worthies were trou- 
bled by the freedom which the Dutch allowed to 
authors and printers. 

All things considered, the Pilgrim community 
prospered well, for they had been in Leyden only 
about a year when they were able to buy, at a 
bargain, a lot in Bell Alley, or Belfry Lane, in 
the very heart of the city, and its oldest and finest 
part, directly opposite and parallel with St. Peter's 
Church, and adjoining on the rear the lot and 
house where the other English churcli worshiped. 
It was within almost a stone's throw of the uni- 
versity and the Rapenburg upon the one side, and 
of Broad Street, on which was the City Hall, upon 
the other ; that is, about midway between the two. 
The i^urchasers were four men, not one of whom 
went to America, — John Robinson, the pastor ; 
William Jepson, the carpenter, his brother-in-law ; 
Randolph Tickens, a looking-glass maker, and 
Henry Wood. These four, as agents of the church 
company, bought a house and garden, paying for 
them eight thousand guilders, which, expressed in 



WORK AND PLAY IN LEYBEN 127 

our money values of to-day, would be about six- 
teen thousand dollars. Of this sura they jjaid two 
thousand guilders down, and the remainder in 
easy installments during May of every year until 
all was paid, — " the last penny with the first." 

The deed — the scene of the drawing and reg- 
istry of which we can, after our visits to the City 
Hall, easily imagine — was dated May 5, 1611. 
There are some who imagine the Pilgrim Fathers 
to have been men directly inspired to invent in- 
stitutions and customs, such, for example, as the 
registration of land deeds and mortfrag'es. Such 
notions and statements are amusing to one who 
has made himself acquainted with the riches of 
Leyden's archives, and of those at Leeuwai'den, 
Groningen, ZwoUe, Dordrecht, and other Dutch 
cities. The Pilgrims saw much and improved on 
some things which they saw, but we Americans 
are debtors to the Dutch as well as to the Eng- 
lish. The registration of deeds and mortgages 
and the ease of access for proof and publicity is 
an old stoiy in the Netherlands, and for the sev- 
enteenth century a wonderful one. 

We have also copied out from the Dutch ar- 
chives a sketch of the grounds and lots as they were 
before the purchase, showing that the lot which 
they bought from Jan de La Laing was the one 
nearest the Commandery and Heeren Straat. 
At this Commandery, as being the military head- 
quarters. Miles Standish and other English offi- 



128 WOEK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

cers would no doubt frequently visit or be on 
duty. Here, perhaps, Standish first got acquainted 
with the brave men who were to be his future 
comrades in arms beyond sea. The lot purchased 
of La Laing, and one of two owned by him, was 
one hundred and twenty-five feet in length ; and 
at the rear of it, just beyond a well, rose a wall 
inclosing the land on which stood the old chapel 
of the Veiled Nuns' Cloister, on the lower floor of 
which the English church, to which the Rev. Rob- 
ert Durie preached, met for worship, while on the 
upper floor was the famous university library. 

Here was their opportunity. They had land 
enough on which to build a number of small 
houses in which families could live, forming a 
settlement which would attract little public no- 
tice ; for to the outward eye it was much like those 
numerous comnmnities, not only of nuns and 
monks, but also of aged married couj^les, and of 
old men and women, which were so common in 
the Netherlands. Within these hofs, or courts, 
where we see many little houses built around the 
central garden or open space, a noteworthy pro- 
portion of the less active part of the inhabitants 
of Holland still live. There are over forty hofs 
in Leyden and many more in Amsterdam. Hence, 
we frequently find the word " hof ," a memorial of 
origins, in Dutch family names. Thus this fea- 
ture of Dutch city life fitted admirably to the 
Separatists' needs, and enabled them to carry out 



WOBE AND PLAY IN LEYBEN 129 

their purpose without seeming to be odd or eccen- 
tric. The Pilgrims were able to live as a genial 
society, having their own rules of life. " They 
stood on their own legs " more closely even than 
when at Scrooby or in Plymouth, for they were 
more independent. They had less alloy and adul- 
teration in their mass than when in the wilder- 
ness. 

Robinson's large " house " became their place 
of worship; for then, as now and in the early 
New Testament times, a church was not a build- 
ing, but a congregation of believing Christians. 
Their edifice for worship), whether looking like 
a "church" or not, was their meeting "house." 
The Pilgrims willingly and gladly chose to do 
what the Roman Catholics and other dissenters 
and sects outside the state church were compelled 
to do, that is, to worship in a house that did not 
look like a " church." They were people who 
cared more for reality than phenomena. To them 
the life was more than the meat, and the body 
more than the raiment. Furthermore, they were 
familiar with such New Testament passages as 
Rom. 16. 5 ; 1 Cor. 16. 19 ; Col. 4. 15. It must 
not be forgotten that in North English parlance 
the word " house " meant particularly the parlor, 
place for conversation, or chief sitting or living 
room, and in this part of Robinson's dwelling 
was the meeting " house." 

Under the direction of Jepson, who was a car- 



130 WOEE AND PLAY IN LEYBEN 

penter, there were put up no fewer than twenty- 
one houses, probably then built of wood, though 
now the little houses standing on the same lot are 
of brick; and so this Pilgrim place of abode 
made a " town " within the city. Primitive Ger- 
manic speech made a distinction between the 
" house " and the " home ; " the former was the 
edifice or dwelling, while the latter was the ground 
within which was the house. The town was the 
hedge or inclosure wherein the community dwelt. 
To this day the Dutch word " tuin," the original 
of our word " town," means a garden. When a 
bill advertising a house and lot to be sold is 
posted, as the owner of the lot in Bell Alley pos- 
sibly had caused to be done before Robinson 
purchased, the sign is " Huis en tuyn te koop," 
or literally, house and garden for sale. 

Without holding their goods in common, the 
Pilgrims made a covenant with each other to bear 
one another's burdens. It is even possible that 
the whole company was accommodated inside the 
houses, which were arranged on two sides of the 
long quadrangle. When, years afterwards, they 
made a settlement at Plymouth, it was laid out 
on exactly the same model — " two rows of houses 
and a fair street." 

These humble dwellings of the church company 
in Leyden were not built with all the solidity, 
comforts, and conveniences of the best Dutch 
houses, which stand on piles, are of brick well 



WOKE AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 131 

anchored with iron, and have walls tiled, papered, 
or tapestried, many windows furnishing abun- 
dance of light and air, spacious hearths and 
chimneys, sociable stoop or doorsteps, with a 
canopy and seats, and those handy double doors 
which allow ventilation and light while keeping 
out animal intruders. Nevertheless in the Pilgrim 
settlement the dwellings were doubtless made 
as cheery and comfortable as the means of their 
owners allowed. The purchasers did not get 
possession of their property until May 1, 1612, 
for the Dutch moving day was May 1. This idea 
having been borrowed by the founders of New 
Netherland, " Moving Day," on May 1, is now 
an American " institution " as surely as " Wash 
Day," instituted by the Pilgrim women at Cape 
Cod, comes on Monday. 

It was not Robinson's house, nor the Pesyn 
Hof , standing on the old site, which the American 
envoy John Adams, in 1781, visited with emotion, 
mistakenly supposing that he had entered the 
Pilgrims' place of meeting. The building in 
which John and Abigail Adams stood was that 
wherein the English and Scottish Presbyterians 
worshiped, — the old Veiled Nuns' Cloister. As 
a matter of fact, the Pilgrim property passed 
from the hands of the " Brownists " in 1637, after 
Jepson, the last owner, had died. While William 
Penn was in Holland, gathering his Dutch emi- 
grants to help in founding Pennsylvania, Robin- 



132 WORK AND PLAY IN LEYDEN 

son's house and some others were, in whole or 
in part, taken down. In the Hof, on the site of 
the little Pilgrim settlement, was erected a Home 
for Aged Persons of Walloon Extraction. As 
such it stands to-day, doing, with the forty or 
more similar settlements in Leyden, its nohle 
work of charity. No country takes better care of 
its poor than Nederland. On the outer walls of 
this house, and of St. Peter's Church opposite, 
are American tablets in honor of Robinson. 

In true primitive and apostolical fashion, this 
church in Robinson's house dwelt in the unity of 
the Spirit and in the bonds of peace. Members 
of the Reformed churches of England, Scotland, 
France, and the Netherlands were received into 
communion. The Pilgrim congregation, though 
at its core English, was as cosmopolitan as Chris- 
tianity itself, having in its membership the repre- 
sentatives of seven nations, four from the islands 
and at least three from the continent. Its bond 
of union was not in a set of logical propositions, 
or a creed in a form of words, but in a covenant 
of mutual love and service, and of loyalty to the 
Divine Master. Under the training of their 
noble, self-effacing pastor, who ever charged them 
to receive the truth by whatever channel it should 
come to them, they throve in all holy virtues and 
graces. Robinson " was very confident that the 
Lord had more truth and light to break forth 
out of his holy Word." 



CHAPTER XI 

LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

One darling hope and set purpose of these 
Leyden upholders of the primitive democracy of 
the church of Christ was that they might pro- 
pagate their doctrines. Dwelling in a commu- 
nity where printers and cheap printing materials 
abounded, they had an inviting opportunity to 
fulfill their mission by means of the types. 
There was no absolute liberty anywhere in Europe 
during the early seventeenth century, but per- 
Jiaps the largest measure of it was in the Dutch 
republic, and of this liberty the Pilgrims took 
advantage. The Dutch being as Gentiles, these 
gospellers would preach first to those of their own 
household in the English home-land. 

It is not surprising, therefore, that so early as 
October, 1616, Elder Brewster, who had hereto- 
fore supported himself comfortably by teaching 
the English language to Danes and Germans, be- 
gan printing books containing those sentiments 
which were in advance of his time, but which are 
now widely accepted. Thomas Brewer furnished 
the money, and William Brewster set up the 
type. This work infuriated King James of Eng- 



184 LIFE UN DEE A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

land, who set his envoy at the Hague, Sir Dudley 
Carleton, on a chase after Brewster, which led to 
a lively game of hide and seek. 

The facts make an interesting narrative, which 
may be read almost in full in Professor Arber's 
book, " The Story of the Pilgrim Fathers," but 
the limits of this work do not allow the space for 
its recital. At least fifteen books, " if not more, 
were produced in the thirty-three months, at the 
furthest, between October, 1616, and June, 1619, 
both inclusive." Most of these were " Brownist " 
books, which contained sentiments that are per- 
fectly harmless in a free country, but which were 
regarded then as moral dynamite. 

One or two of the pamphlets (by the Rev. 
David Calderwood) which Brewster printed, 
exposed King James's political chicanery in at-» 
tempting, at the Perth Assembly, to compel the 
Scottish churches to conform to the Anglican 
establishment. These Leyden "libels" nearly 
drove James Stuart crazy. His ambassador, Sir 
Dudley Carleton, had all Amsterdam, Leyden, and 
Middelburg ransacked to find the printer. Brew- 
ster, having gone to England to attend to the 
scheme of emigrating to America, escaped the 
fury, but Brewer was seized in his stead, and 
the types were confiscated. From July, 1619, to 
February, 1620, there was a lively tilt in politics 
and diplomacy between the monarchy and the 
republic, which powerfully excited the Pilgrims 




SIR DUDLEY CARLETON 



LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 135 

and illustrated to them both the charms and the 
perils of federal government. For Brewer the 
result was a journey to England under the pro- 
tection of the Dutch republic, at his sovereign's 
expense ; but the ability of Carleton and great 
friendship of Maurice, the stadholder, finally en- 
abled James to gain his main point — the restric- 
tion of libels against the sovereign of England, 
then the chief ally of the Dutch republic. 

If any one thing convinced the wavering mem- 
bers and decided the Pilgrim comjiany to emi- 
grate as a body, it must have been this seizing of 
their elder's types and the malignant determina- 
tion of their " dread sovereign " to destroy even 
themselves if possible. The stoppage of their 
printing press meant the end of all propagation 
of their principles and the carrying out of the 
missionary idea, which with the Pilgrims were su- 
preme. They had no thought of converting the 
Dutch people. It was England and their own 
countrymen whom they had hoped to enlighten 
and influence. Now this hope was blasted. The 
Pilgrim press was at an end. A ship must wait 
upon them, that they might do their work beyond 
the Atlantic. 

The year 1619 was one of continual excitement 
to the Pilgrim company. Besides the royal chase 
after Brewster, the affair of Brewer, and the de- 
struction of their printing operations, there was 
a tremendous commotion in church and state. 



136 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

The real question at issue in 1619 in the Dutch 
republic was much the same as that settled in 
1865 in the American republic, the preservation 
of the Union. The decision in both cases was 
that the central government had a right to be 
superior to the various states which composed 
the Union, and to compel their obedience. In 
the one case slavery was the jjretext, in the other 
theology. 

Leyden was the focus of the excitement. In 
this city the two places and edifices where theo- 
logy and State-right had their citadels were the 
university on the one hand, and the City Hall on 
the other. It was just between the two, not much 
over a quarter of a mile from either, and in the 
thoroughfare between them, that the Pilgrims 
lived. 

From first to last the Pilgrims were no doubt 
unanimously on the side of the Unionists in poli- 
tics and of the Calvinists in theology. They 
were opposed, both socially and politically, to the 
Arminians. 

In 1579 the Dutch provinces, or states, had 
formed at Utrecht a federation, with a written 
constitution in twenty-six articles. The act and 
document were referred to as " The Union of 
Utrecht," and the city was called "The Old 
Cradle of Liberty." At first the gov'ernment of 
the Dutch United States issued its commissions 
in the name of Philip of Spain, just as the Eng- 



LIFE UN DEE A FEDERAL GOVEENMENT 137 

lish Parliament, during the English Civil War, 
issued theirs in the name of Charles I., and the 
authorities of Massachusetts and the Continental 
Congi-ess in 1775 wrote theii's in the name of 
George III. Even Leyden University was, ac- 
cording to a fiction of law, founded in the name 
of Philip of Spain. This ruler, who was not 
king of the country, but oidy Count of Holland, 
though spoken of in the charter as a benignant 
protector, would gladly have burned up the Pro- 
testant university with all the professors and 
students inside of it. 

In 1581 the Dutch United States dropped the 
legal fiction and declared themselves forever free 
of Spain. With this declaration of independence, 
as well as with the national Dutch flag, the red, 
white, and blue, the Pilgrims were sufficiently 
familiar. In the Union of Utrecht, or the written 
constitution, it had been agreed by Article XIII. 
that each province should have a right to reg- 
ulate its own religious affairs, but at that time 
the only religions then in mind were Romanism 
and Calvinism. The Ai-minians claimed that 
this thirteenth article referred to any religion, or 
at least any phase of the Christian religion in its 
Protestant form. The Calvinists insisted that it 
meant only the Reformed religion, which they 
identified with Calvinism. Just here was the 
point at issue, the hinge on which the question of 
national or of state sovereignty and of orthodoxy 



138 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

or heterodoxy should turn. Roughly speaking, 
on one side were the people and nation at large, 
the Calvinists ; on the other were the aristocratic 
elements, Arminiaus and stanch upholders of 
State-right, among whom were many unselfish 
patriots and earnest Christians. 

To understand the situation, we must go back 
to the century before and see how the Nether- 
landex's changed their views, or rather grew out 
of the Roman Catholic form of Christianity into 
that which is founded upon the Scriptures alone. 

It has been demonstrated by the late Dr. de 
Hoop Scheffer that the Reformation among the 
masses of the Dutch jjeople was, first of all, 
wrought by the people called Anabaptists. Under 
William the Silent in the year 1577, they were 
protected in that noble order of his to the magis- 
trates at Middelburg, which is one of the land- 
marks in modern history and one of the spiritual 
corner-stones of the Dutch and American repub- 
lics : — 

" We declare to you that you have no right to 
interfere with the conscience of any one, so long 
as he has done nothing that works injury to an- 
other person, or a public scandal." 

This was eight years before William Brewster, 
with Secretary Davison, made his first visit into 
the Netherlands, as we have seen, and thirty- 
three years before Roger Williams, the apostle of 
"soul-liberty," was born. To this day, as for 



LIFU UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 139 

over three centuries and a half, the Mennonites, 
the successors of the " Anabaptists," are numer- 
ous and influential in the Netherlands. 

The next I'eformatory wave in the Netherlands 
was the Lutheran, which influenced many peojile 
of the better classes, the wealthy merchants, but 
did not become in any sense national or general. 

The third tidal wave, which is the most potent 
of the three movements, was that propagated by 
Calvin, and the men of like mind from the city 
republic of Geneva. This system of doctrines 
harmonized most subtly with the Dutch tempera- 
ment and character. If any one to-day, confused, 
as so many Americans and English are, as to the 
difference between Dutchmen and Germans, 
would make the demarcation clear, let him note 
but one fact. Roughly speaking, the Germans 
are Lutherans, the Dutch are Calvinists. Cal- 
vinism is almost invariably democratic in spirit 
and republican in form. 

It was by no accident that the ultra-democratic 
doctrines, both of the " Anabaptists " and of Cal- 
vinism, came from the Swiss republic, or federa- 
tion of states, and were so eagerly embraced by 
the Dutch. In all federal governments there 
must be toleration of various ideas and opinions, 
and both Switzerland' and the Dutch republic 
well illustrate this truth. The fact that a few of 
the Highland Scots, who in the days of the clan 
system and semi-feudalism rallied around the 



140 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

Stuart pretender, " Bonnie Prince Charlie," were 
Calvinists, forms no true exception to the rule 
that Calvinism is the nurse of democracy and 
freedom. 

The Arminians took their name from James 
Arminius, professor of theology in Leyden. He 
was a noble and aspiring servant of God who 
loved his fellow men. When a boy, living at 
Oudewater, the Spaniards had captured the town 
and massacred the people, and he was left an or- 
phan. He grew up a bright student and became 
a noble citizen and patriot. He secured the 
repeal of hostile legislation against the Jews, and 
was always warmly in favor of full toleration. 
When made professor he began to modify the 
strict system of Calvin. His rival and opiaonent, 
Professor Gomarus, opened a public controversy 
with him. The discussions soon passed out be- 
yond the scholastic and aristocratic circles and 
down among the common people. The whole na- 
tion became a school of thought and argument on 
one of the greatest themes that can occupy the 
mind of man — the i-econciliation of human free 
will with the divine sovereignty. Arminius did 
not live to see his doctrines and those of Calvin 
forged into political weapons and his country- 
men on the brink of civil war. He died October 
19, 1609, while the Pilgrims were in Amsterdam. 
It was nearly a century and a half afterwards 
that John Wesley in England preached a form 



LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 141 

of Christianity quite other than that of the Dutch 
divine, which is called " Arminianisni." 

By the year 1615 the lines of division in the 
Dutch republic showed that on one side were 
ranged the rich and wealthy people of the cities 
and those influential in municipal councils and 
state governments, especially in the mighty single 
State of Holland. These were the Arminians and 
men emphasizing State-right. These suspected 
that the ambition of the stadholder was to be- 
come a king and to destroy the republic and local 
freedom. They feared that the soldier would 
override law, and the sword dictate both might 
and right. 

On the other hand were the masses of the 
peojile at large, led and directed at first by their 
domines, or pastors, and afterwards by the stad- 
holder and his advisers. At first the question 
was purely theological; but where State and 
Church are vuiited, and the life of one seems to 
depend upon the life of the other, it is not possi- 
ble to keep theology and politics apart. It is, as 
state churchmen fear, very much as in the case 
of the Siamese twins, — the death of one is the 
death of the other, though the experience of the 
American republic proves that this is not neces- 
sarily so. At first, also, as there seems little 
reason to doubt, the Arminians, having wealth 
and power on their side, were oppressive and 
overbearins:. The Calvinists were almost fanati- 



142 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

cal Union men, and suspected that the Arminians 
were at heart secessionists and would sell out to 
Spain. They called Barne veldt a pope, a tyrant, 
and a traitor. So far as we can judge, he was a 
sincere patriot, though not a statesman of deep 
insight, nor of sympathy with the commons. He 
was a man of precedents, unable to see or mea- 
sure new forces. He had opposed Leicester and 
the " English party." In many respects he was 
a public functionary of consummate ability, and 
unceasing industry. Intellectually he was an 
agnostic, his motto being " To know nothing is 
the safest faith." 

The two leaders in whom the conflicting prin- 
ciples were incarnated were Maurice, the soldier, 
and Barneveldt, the statesman. The former was 
a young man of splendid military abilities, though 
not of pure private life ; the latter was a sage in 
years and of stainless private character. The one 
was the head of the Union army and the stad- 
holder of several of the States. The other was 
the soul of the legislature of Holland and the 
ablest man in the national congress, or States- 
General. On the 4th of August, 1617, the issue 
between union and secession seemed squarely 
drawn, when, after Maurice's military demonstra- 
tion in the Cloister church at the Hague, the 
legislature of Holland, at Barneveldt's motion, 
passed the famous Sharp Resolve, which stated 
the doctrine of State sovereignty in its plainest 



LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 143 

form. Then began the enrollment and training 
of State militia in the interest of State-right and 
possibly of secession. 

In Leyden and Utrecht the partisans of Barne- 
veldt were most numerous, and here the waart- 
gelders, or State militia, were in greatest force. 
In front of and surrounding the City Hall in 
Leyden had been built a strong fort of oak 
beams bolted together and furnished with iron 
prongs to prevent escalade. This fort was mounted 
with cannon and garrisoned by Arminian militia. 
During the troubles several citizens were killed. 
With bloodshed so very near their own doors, 
and the flames of civil war apparently ready to 
burst out, what wonder is it that at this very time 
the Pilgi'ims began action which ended in their 
settlement in America? Between King James 
and Dutch deviltry there seemed little to choose 
but the deep sea. 

There must have been lively talk at the Pil- 
grim supper tables when day's work was over, on 
the evening of October 23, 1618. Fences, curb- 
stones, and walls were plastered with political 
squibs, rhymes, and caricatures of the opposing 
parties, but on the whole they pointed to the wan- 
ing fortunes of the Arminians. On the previous 
evening, Maurice, the Union general, had sent 
some companies of national troops to garrison 
the city. The supremacy of the red, white, and 
blue flag, the Union banner, over the lion flag of 



144 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

the State of Holland, was demonstrated in Ley- 
den, as it was soon to be over that of the cross 
and shield of Utrecht. 

On the next day the Arrainian cause in Leyden 
was dead beyond power of resurrection. Maurice 
came to the City Hall with his staff and force, 
all in their brilliant uniforms and amid an im- 
mense crowd of people. The city magistracy was 
changed. The palisade, or fort, which had been 
dubbed " Barneveldt's teeth," was torn to j)ieces 
by the jjeople, who dragged the timber and iron 
to the market-place, where they were sold at auc- 
tion for fuel or souvenirs. It was a day of great 
popular rejoicing in Leyden, and in the general 
deliffht there is little doubt that some of the Pil- 
grim men and boys had their share. 

The people in the seven States of the republic 
had refused to take the decision of a provincial 
synod, or to have a single State like Holland settle 
the questions at issue. They demanded the voice 
of the whole nation in council and the ultima- 
tum of the national church. The great national 
Synod of Dordrecht, " the only Protestant QEcu- 
menical Council," was therefore called. It was 
opened on Monday, November 13, 1618, with 
delegates from nearly all the countries and states 
in which there were Reformed churches, including 
Great Britain, which sent over several eminent 
men. These sat at a table by themselves and 
received extra pay, allowances, and gifts, the party 



LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 145 

in power being very anxious to keep the friend- 
ship of King James. 

The synod was in its management wholly a 
political affair and the creation of the Dutch 
Congress. It had but one purpose — the con- 
demnation of the Arminians and the strengthen- 
ing of the national jDower. After one hundred 
and nineteen sessions held in the Artillery Arm- 
ory at Dordrecht, the synod concluded with its 
famous declarations called the Canons of the 
Synod of Dort. The Arminian ministers had 
their salaries paid, and being invited to leave the 
country, they did so. They were in all about 
two hundred in number, and most of them went 
out quietly and peaceably. They were not har- 
assed or persecuted, as were the Dissenters at 
this time in England ; they were only shut off 
from the state church patronage. 

Maurice was very slow in forming a judgment 
or entering upon a line of policy ; but when once 
his mind was made up, he was in action as quick 
as lightning and implacable as death. Confronted 
by threats of secession and seeing, as he believed, 
the raising of troops to resist the Union, he drew 
the sword. 

Barneveldt, on the charge of a purpose to 
" plunge the nation into a blood bath," had been 
arrested and imprisoned, August 29, 1618. The 
question was now what to do with him. As the 
synod progressed, and Maurice felt his course 



146 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

approved, so also the tribunal created to try Bar- 
neveldt became more ready to yield to popular 
clamor. The judges found him guilty, and Mau- 
rice ordered his execution. On the 13th of May, 
1619, four "days after the adjournment of the 
Synod of Dort, the aged statesman was beheaded 
in the public square of the Binnenhof at the 
Hague. This unnecessary act was jirobably a 
judicial murder. It was accomplished in the 
presence of thousands of spectators, including a 
body of English troojis, among whose officers may 
Lave been Miles Standish. 

To those who can understand the situation, 
there is little difficulty in seeing why John Rob- 
inson was strenuously a Calvinist and in favor 
both of the Synod of Dort and of its doctrines, 
and why the members of the Pilgrim company, 
very probably in overwhelming majority if not 
to a man, approved of the action of Maurice, and 
took the Union side. No one need make any 
apology for the Pilgrims in this, unless he is de- 
termined to judge the seventeenth by the light of 
the nineteenth century. 

It is very probable that Robinson attended some 
of the sessions of the synod. He certainly entered 
heart and soul into the controversy. Bradford 
says that he " was an acute and expert disputant, 
very quick and ready, and had much bickering 
with the Arminians, who stood more in fear of 
him than of any of the university of Lej^den." 



LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 147 

Governor Winslow also says, " And our Pastor, 
Master Robinson, in the time when Arminianism 
prevailed so much, at the request of the most 
orthodox divines as Polyander, Festus Hommius, 
etc., disputed daily in the academy at Ley den 
against Episcopius and others, the grand cham- 
pions of that error, and had as good respect 
amongst them as any of their own divines." In- 
deed, Robinson had attended the lectures on both 
sides of the controversy, in order to make up his 
mind. 

It is idle to identify or even make close com- 
parison of the Dutch political Arminianism of 
the period from A. D. 1609 to 1621, with the 
theological system of Wesley and the Methodist 
Christians. 

Whatever may be the relative merits of the 
theological controversy, into which we cannot here 
enter, it is hard to see how the Leyden com- 
pany, being lovers of freedom and the pure gos- 
pel, could be anything else than what they were. 
They saw, or thought they saw, that the tendency 
of Arminianism then was not, as perhaps Barne- 
veldt saw or thought, to the prevalence of the 
civil spirit over militarism, and law over war, to 
toleration and freedom, to the sure maintenance 
of local rights in politics and of the conscience 
in religion, to national wealth, peace, and unity, 
but wholly to the contrary. 

The Pilgrim company, with the Dutch Calvin- 



148 LIFE UNDER A FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 

ists, believed that Calvinism and union meant 
right thinking and right living before God, a 
strengthened and purified nation, supremacy of 
the national over the local and state government, 
freedom from Rome, the humiliation of Spain, 
colonization of America, and a free development 
of the human spirit in all departments of activity, 
especially in schools, education, and everything 
that uplifts the plain people. To them the tri- 
imiph of the Union meant democracy and the 
rights of the people, as well as orthodoxy in reli- 
gion. It is very probable that these exiles for 
conscience' sake rejoiced equally with the natives 
at the issue. Probably no man understood the 
whole situation better than Elder Brewster, John 
Robinson, and William Bradford. Their feeling 
toward Maurice was probably much like that 
which John Bright in our day had for Abraham 
Lincoln or Ulysses Grant. 



CHAPTER XII 

THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

One notable point at issue between Barneveldt 
and Maurice was over a matter that directly con- 
cerned tlie Pilgrim company and influenced their 
future. The Dutch Calvinists believed, with Mau- 
rice, in colonization. Barneveldt and his par- 
tisans did not. Long before the West India 
Company was actually chartered under that 
name, the Hollanders began the agitation about 
settling New Netherland. During the time of 
truce, between 1609 and 1619, it would have been 
an act of war for the Dutch to send emigrants to 
the Hudson River region, because Spain claimed 
all North America. But though they would not 
break faith by taking action, they discussed the 
matter. Among the first, so early as 1615, to 
plan a colony beyond sea, was Jesse de Forest, 
one of the several hundred Walloons living in 
Leyden, working side by side with the English 
dyers and silk-workers, his place of worship being 
but a few feet away from Robinson's home. 

As Maurice, Prince of Orange, is in a large 
sense the founder of New York State, so is Jesse 
de Forest of New York City. De Forest was 



150 TUE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

born at Avesnes, in Hainault, from wliicli pro- 
vince many Protestant refugees reached England. 
Many Americans, as well as English folk, de- 
scended from these now spell their names Haines, 
Hanway, Hanna, or with some other variation. 
Of good social connections, the parents of Jesse 
de Forest left their native city, probably to escape 
religious prosecution, and arrived at Leyden in 
1603, living there a year and a half, and then 
going to Amsterdam. Gerard de Forest, brother 
of Jesse, lived in Leyden from 1605 to 1654, as 
a dyer. Jesse is found in Leyden in February, 
1615, where one of his children was baptized. A 
few months later, in July, he applied to Sir Dud- 
ley Carleton, asking assistance by which his com- 
pany might get to Virginia, there being fifty- 
six Walloon families wanting to go. But King 
James, though he was willing to grant permission, 
refused assistance, and the project failed. It was 
not until 1622 that de Forest was able to carry 
out his scheme. The ship New Netherland in 
March, 1623, carried to Manhattan Island and 
the Walloon's Boght, or bend, now called Wal- 
labout in Brooklyn, thirty families, and thus be- 
gan the settlement of New Netherland and the 
great Empire State. 

How early the Pilgrims began to talk of find- 
ing a new home, and one as far as possible out of 
the direct reach of King James and the persecut- 
ing bishops, is not known. Between the Span- 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 151 

iards and King James there was little to choose, 
but where should they go ? Ireland and Zealand 
were proposed, and so was Venezuela. Zealand 
seemed rather a congenial home, for the Sabbath 
laws were very strict there, but land was high, 
and English people would sooner or later become 
Dutch. 

There had been many attempts to plant an 
English colony upon the American shores, but 
none had proved a success until that started at 
Jamestown. Even this had many troubles and 
trials, and its continued existence was still very 
uncertain at the time when the Pilgrims were be- 
coming restless with schemes of migration. With 
the Spanish war against the Dutch about to open, 
and King James and his bishops rampant and 
making their lives dangerous ; between the dif- 
ficulty of some of their less qualified members in 
getting a living, — they having been not skilled 
mechanics, but only plain country people, — and 
the probability of losing their names and their 
language, and being submerged among the Dutch 
people, like " the ten lost tribes of Israel ; " the 
small likelihood of enforcing their notions of 
Sabbath-keeping upon the Dutch ; the inability 
of their leading men, Robinson, Brewster, Wins- 
low, Bradford and others, to give such an Eng- 
lish education to their children as they themselves 
had received or now desired ; and last but not 
least, with their press or social means of propa- 



152 THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

gating their ideas destroyed — it is no wonder 
they longed to make a change. They yearned to 
go where they could keep alive their convictions 
and'propagate their ideas of church government 
and i3ractical Christianity ; but to go to James- 
town, where the political bishops could touch 
them, would be hardly better than returning to 
England. 

Through Sir Edwin Sandys, their friend, or at 
least the friend of Brewster, they learned that 
the sovereign would grant no freedom of con- 
science in America. After thinking it over, King 
James referred their request for toleration to the 
Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of 
London. This was like recommending lambs to 
wolves. They soon found that no Brownists or 
Separatists need apply to go to the James River 
country. There was already a Virginia Company 
formed, but it was divided into two hostile fac- 
tions. One party represented the nobler and 
progressive, and the other reactionary and un- 
lovely Englaud, and the former befriended the 
Leyden Separatists. Hard as it was for the Pil- 
grims to resolve to try the ocean and wilderness, 
they found it, as Bradford says, harder than they 
expected to get leave and opportunity to go. 

Robinson was probably one of the first to de- 
cide upon removal elsewhere. He is known to 
have spoken of his design of founding a free 
religious colony to two of liis Dutch friends. Pro- 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 153 

fessor A. Walaens and Daniel Festus Hommius. 
When the directors of the New Netherland Trad- 
ing Company heard through these two gentlemen 
of Robinson's desire, they made "large offers," 
as Bradford says, promising not only to give the 
Pilgrim colonists free passage to America, but 
also to furnish every family with cattle. Robin- 
son thought at that time that about four hundred 
families from Holland and England would form 
the settlement. Since these Pilgrims had an ex- 
cellent reputation in Leyden for honesty, dili- 
gence, and general good character, and most of 
them knew Dutch pretty well, they would make 
first-rate colonists. The directors of the New 
Netherland company, on February 20, 1620, ap- 
plied to Maurice, the stadholder, telling about 
this English preacher of Leyden who was versed 
in the Dutch language. They asked permission 
not only to plant the colony, but also requested 
that two Dutch men-of-war might convey the 
colonists to New Netherland. With Spanish 
cruisers on the seas and King James ready to 
seize these people as his prey, danger must be 
provided against. 

When looked at by Maurice and the States- 
General in a political and diplomatic light, the 
proposition to transport these Englishmen to 
America was something quite the i-everse of what 
had been seen through the rosy commercial me- 
dium of the Amsterdam directors. In the first 



154 THE DEBATE UPON EMIGEATION 

place, it was not certain but that King James, on 
the strength of the fact that Henry Hudson was 
an Englishman, might claim New Netherland as 
English property. Ridiculous though the idea 
might seem to be, the English government had 
detained the Half Moon upon its arrival at 
Plymouth en route for Amsterdam ; and although 
the ship and crew reached home, it is not certain 
that Henry Hudson ever got again to Holland. 
Furthermore, the idea of offending both Spain 
and King James at once could not be entertained. 
The " Spanish party " was at this time very pow- 
erful at the English court, and King James was 
angling for the alliance of one of his children 
with a Spanish princess. To help openly and 
directly a nest of heretics who had printed books 
which stung King James and angered him bej^ond 
the telling, so that he wanted to seize the authors 
and printers and have " the Devil rive their 
souls and bodies all in collops and cast them into 
hell," would be a suicidal policy. It would have 
looked exactly like a personal insult to the British 
James, the seeking of a quarrel, and a direct defi- 
ance of the government at London, thus to have 
any official sanction given at the Hague to this 
company of Englishmen. A scheme which would 
not only give the Separatists aid and comfort, 
but which required the employment of war-ships 
of the republic to cover and protect them under 
its flag, could not be tolerated for a moment. 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 155 

Then the war with Spain was to be resumed 
in a few months, and every man and ship, car- 
tridge and cannon, was urgently needed at home. 
The petition of the directors of the New Nether- 
land company was therefore denied. Robinson, 
who knew local and foreign politics so well, must 
have foreseen the issue ; for prior to the stad- 
holder's decision, negotiations had been opened, 
most probably through Brewster, with the Vir- 
ginia Company in London. 

Brewster in England had one strong and gen- 
erous friend in Sir Edwin Sandys, whom we may 
call one of the political forefathers of the United 
States of America. When president of the Vir- 
ginia Company in 1620, he introduced the Frisian 
custom of unconstrained and secret voting by 
means of the written ballot. He was a son of 
the Archbishop of York, Edwin Sandys, who 
in 1576 had appointed Brewster's father as his 
agent at Scrooby. Before his death, the arch- 
bishop had transferred the manor to his son. Sir 
Samuel Sandys, who was Brewster's landlord. Sir 
Edwin Sandys, the brother of Samuel, a liberal 
member of the government, opposed the " Spanish 
party " at court, secured the foundation of a con- 
stitutional state with a representative government 
in Virginia, and laid generous plans for the Pil- 
grims' proposed settlement in America. It was 
he who obtained two patents for the Plymouth 
Colony. It was probably Sir Edwin Sandys, 



156 THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

as Dr. Edward Eggleston suggests, who lent the 
Leyden congregation three hundred pounds with- 
out interest for three years, and this sum, when 
the Pilgrims could get no rates better than those 
of Asiatic money-lenders, was equal to about five 
thousand dollars in our money of to-day. In all 
probability it was Sir Edwin Sandys's aid in 
friendship and money that enabled and decided 
the Pilgrim company to embark for America. 

After prayer, conference, and a sermon from 
Robinson, on the text in 1 Samuel xxiii. 3. 4, the 
younger and stronger portion of the comjjany 
decided that their Judah was Leyden and their 
Keilah was in America, and that between King- 
James and the Spaniards there was little differ- 
ence. So trusting in God they i-esolved to sail. 

Mr. Thomas Weston, a London merchant, and 
about seventy other Englishmen planned an emi- 
gration scheme at ten pounds a share. Each 
colonist was to be allowed to work two days in a 
week for his own benefit. At the end of seven 
years, the profits on the total possessions and 
earnings of the colonists were to be divided be- 
tween the colony and the corjjoration. On this 
basis articles were signed. 

While Carver and Cushman went over to Eng- 
land to get the money and to charter a ship and 
equip it with provisions, those who were bent on 
going, — the strongest, bravest, and most of them 
the younger ones, — began to jjrepare, selling off 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 157 

everything except what they might need for the 
voyage and for life in the New Workl. Weston's 
company was called the Merchant Adventurers, 
and their great idea was to get money through 
the fisheries and farming in New England and 
by means of the work of the Pilgrims or other 
colonists. The Adventurers got fresh powers 
from the Plymouth company and a patent grant- 
ing a measure of self-government, and also, with 
what must have seemed tremendous English im- 
pudence and uuscrupulousness to the Dutchmen, 
the right to land near the mouth of the Hudson 
River. 

In order to get reenforcements of colonists 
from England, Carver and Cushinan associated 
Christopher Martin to carry out their arrange- 
ments. If we are to believe Cushman, this Mr. 
Martin, of Essex, proved to be a bad-tempered and 
impracticable man. When the Merchant Adven- 
turers met with Cushman, they wanted an altera- 
tion in the original terms which showed great 
greediness in these speculators ; and Cushman, 
without consulting the Leyden people or his joint 
representatives, agreed to it. By this, each coL)- 
nist was obliged to work every day in the week 
except Sundays, having no time to himself. The 
whole of the work and profits of the colonists, 
going into a common fund, was to be equally 
divided at the end of seven years between the 
capitalists and the workmen. 



158 THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

As soon as the Leyden company heard of this 
new contract, they declared that Cushman had 
made conditions more fit for thieves and slaves 
than for honest men. Nevertheless they consented 
to them. Captain John Smith offered his services 
to the Leyden Pilgrims ; but these were declined, 
possibly because Smith's true character was 
known to them, but more probably because they 
had already agreed with Miles Standish that he 
should be their military commander ; and better 
always one good general than two in command. 

In Holland the Speedwell, a pinnace of sixty 
tons burden, was bought and fitted out, and the 
English pilot arrived toward the end of May. 
Among the Leyden men, there were few, if any, 
— possibly there was not one man, — familiar with 
ships or sea life. No harpoons or whaling im- 
plements and very little fishing tackle seem to 
have been provided. In their eagerness to get 
away promptly and across the sea in summer 
weather, that they might reach the Hudson River 
region before frost, they made the mistake of 
ordering for the Speedwell heavier and taller 
masts and larger spars than her hull had been 
built to receive, thus altering most unwisely and 
disastrously her " trim." Bradford says she was 
" overmasted," but whether in England or Hol- 
land is not certain. Captain George Waymouth 
and Sir Walter Raleigh have left us severe criti- 
cisms on the English-built ships of their time, as 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 159 

being" of bad proportions, and not being- able to 
bear sail or steer readily, " for want of art in pro- 
portioning of the mould and fittings of the mast 
and tackling." We do not hear of these invet- 
erate landsmen and townsfolk, who were about to 
venture on the Atlantic, taking counsel of Dutch 
shipbuiklers or mariners as to the proportions of 
their craft. 

When later, however, the English captain, who 
did not relish going on the voyage, found this out, 
as he quickly would, he crowded on too much sail 
so that the hull became as "leaky as a sieve." 
The Pilgrim experiences with seafaring men do 
not raise our opinion of the latter. It is a monoto- 
nous and discouraging story of dishonesty and 
profanity. Bradford tells us that the Speed- 
well was afterwards " sold and put into her old 
trim ; " that is, masts of the right size and weight 
for the hull were set in. Then " she made many 
voyages, and performed her service very suffi- 
ciently ; to the great profit of her owners." It is 
even possible that from this mistake of the Ley- 
den landsmen, the subsequent misei'ies and trou- 
bles of the seafaring passengers and sick, starv- 
ing, and dying colonists came. Professor Arber, 
who calls the captain a " rascal," says : " For this 
fatuous and supreme error of judgment in busi- 
ness matters, and all that came of it, the Leyden 
church alone was responsible. No one in Eng- 
land had anything to do with it." All of which, 



IGO THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 

SO long as we do not know every Jetiiil, may be 
true. 

Both Speedwell and Mayflower are names of 
well-known plants and blossoms in England, 
though the name " Mayflower " is wholly a popu- 
lar, rather than a scientific or botanical term. 
In England it may be the hawthorn, the cuckoo 
flower, the marsh marigold, or it may be some- 
thing else ; in the United States it is the trail- 
ing arbutus. The name Mayflower was exceed- 
ingly common among English ships. Two of 
Drake's vessels were so named, and there were 
many othei-s called the Mayflower in the records 
of the British navy and merchant marine. 

The speedwell is an herb, with creeping and 
ascending stem, and bright blue flowers in the 
raceme or on a stalk. In England it is also 
named the eye-bright, to say nothing of the terms 
angel's eye, God's eye, bird's eye, and so on, each 
of which was called the si^eedwell. There were 
various varieties of the flower and of the one 
which was formerly much used in medicine. 
Neither Bradford nor Mourt refers to the names 
of these historic ships ; but we find the more 
famous one mentioned in the Plymouth records : 
" The falls (apportionments) of their grounds, 
which came first over in the Mayflower : accord- 
ing as their lots were cast, 1623." The Speed- 
well is first named in Nathaniel Morton's book 
" The New Enaland's Memorial." 



THE DEBATE UPON EMIGRATION 161 

When all was ready, it was resolved that those 
who should go on the Speedwell, before others 
should follow, should be the youngest and strong- 
est ; second, they must be volunteers ; and if a 
majority went, Robinson should go with them ; 
and if a minority, Elder Brewster. If the voy- 
age turned out disastrously, — "if the Lord 
should frown upon our proceedings," — then those 
remaining in Leyden should help those that re- 
turned ; but " if God should be pleased to favor 
them that went, then they also should endeavor 
to help over such as was poor and ancient and 
willing to come." When it came to vote, the 
majority agreed to stay for a while, all excej)t 
a very few intending ultimately to cross the At- 
lantic. 

So it came to pass that the pinnace at Delfs- 
haven was the pioneer of a Pilgrim fleet, consist- 
ing of the Speedwell, Mayflower, Fortune, Anne, 
Little James, Mayflower 2d (1629), and the 
Handmaid (1630). The affectionate term " Pil- 
grim Fathers," coined by later generations, in- 
cludes (1) the members of the Leyden church 
who voted for emigration, whether able or unable 
to go ; (2) those who came from England and 
joined the church. The Mayflower passengers 
constituted the " Old Stock" of Bradford's nam- 
ing. Those who reached New Plymouth in the 
Mayflower, Anne, and Little James were called 
the " Old Comers," or " Forefathers." 



CHAPTER XIII 

WESTWARD ho! 

The inland voyage of the Pilgrims, from the 
Nun's Bridge on the Rapenburg in Leyden to 
Delf shaven, was twenty-four miles in length. 
The route is parallel with the lines of the modern 
rail and tram roads, and in the form of an obtuse 
angle, or like a widened-out V, the point being a 
little below the Hague. The waters to be trav- 
ersed were the Vliet and the Schie. They first 
moved southwestwardly eleven miles, shirting a 
morass, now the dry and green Veen or Fen 
polder, until near Ryswick, and then southwest- 
wardly directly through the city of Delft. At 
the village of Overschie, they went straight 
forward to Delfshaven, on arriving at which, 
they had voyaged alongside of or throiTgh three 
" lands," — Rhiueland, Westland, and Schieland. 

The haven of Delft, or Delfshaven (Delft's 
Haven), was a pretty little town founded in the 
fourteenth century, where were early erected the 
chapel of St. Anthony and other buildings which, 
when the men with their faces set towards Amer- 
ica ariived there, had already seen the sunsets of 
three hundred years. It had its own burgomas- 



WESTWARD HO! 163 

ter, council, and " arms " — a three-banded sliield 
showing, between herring and wheat, a centre of 
alternate strips of white and green. The motto 
on the seal of the brick church, past which the 
Pilgrims sailed, reads " The haven of salvation 
alone with God of Zion is." 

Coming from Leyden it could not be otherwise 
than that these people, at least half of whom, 
pex"haps, had been born in Holland and talked 
Dutch, would know the story of the land and 
water over which they sailed. A generation or 
two before, and during the siege of Leyden, the 
great dike through which, by lock and sluice, they 
were now to pass had been cut to let in the water 
to " over-stream " the whole country up to the 
beleaguered city, in order to bring in the relief 
ships. Between Overschie and Delfshaven the 
makers of New Plymouth floated high above the 
pastures below them, for here the dikes rise in a 
great mass above what is one of the lowest por- 
tions of the Low Countries, much of the land being 
sixteen feet beneath the unit of level or high-tide 
mark at Amsterdam. The great sea dike, which 
runs from the seacoast forty miles into the coun- 
try, has intrusted to it the safety of the whole 
country of South Holland from the Maas River 
to Leyden. 

The Pilgrim pioneers had a night to pass in 
Delfshaven. Where and how did they spend it? 
Fortunately, as Bradford says, they found the 



164 WESTWAED HO! 

ship and all things ready. There was probably 
little sleep for the most of them, who made the 
hours speed along " with friendly entertainment 
and Christian discourse and other real expressions 
of true Christian love." There is no record for 
or against the pretty but baseless tradition that 
the Speedwell passengers and their friends held 
a farewell meeting in the Reformed church of 
Delfshaven. The Book of the Minutes of the 
Consistory covering the year 1620 is not known 
to be in existence, having disappeared some 
years later (1634-1642) during the disputes, or 
" twisten," between the authorities of the church 
and the city. Intrinsic probability is against the 
idea. The local tradition is possibly a true one, 
that most of the emigrants and their friends slept 
in one of the warehouses of the Netherlands Trad- 
ing Company. These were on the banks of the 
canal near the ship's anchorage. Possibly some 
of the passengers or their friends occupied the 
boats and storage houses or huts closer to the 
landing. 

To-day the chief sights for the tourist in Delfs- 
haven are, besides the church, the birthplace and 
the statue of Piet Heyn, the admiral who in 
1628 captured the Spanish silver fleet. The 
maps of Delfshaven in 1620, in the Water-State 
office, show that the frontage of the city and the 
lines of the quays and wharves were quite differ- 
ent from what they are to-day. The imposing 



WESTWARD HO! 165 

windmills now built near the river were not then 
in existence. Nevertheless, the chief canal, streets, 
and older quays were much the same as at pre- 
sent. Out in the river there was then free course 
of deep flowing water, where to-day there is a long 
island. This accumulation of silt could, by the 
year 1761, be sailed over only at high water. It 
is now grass-grown and even hilly. It is pierced 
in the centre with a sluice called the Schiemond, 
or mouth of the Schie, and the whole western half 
of the double island called Riuge Piatt (Rough 
Place) is occupied by various dwellings or edifices 
of industry. The avenue, lined with trees and 
having a southern exposure, fronts the main chan- 
nel of the Maas River, and was (in July, 1892) 
appropriately named by the burgomaster and city 
council of Rotterdam, of which Delf shaven is now 
a part, " Pelgrim Kade ; " that is. Pilgrim Avenue 
or Quay. 

In picturing to our minds the departure of the 
Pilgrims, we cannot imagine the elegantly dressed 
ladies and gentlemen with feathers and silks and 
jewels such as we see in some highly idealized pic- 
tures, any more than we can conjure up, as a cer- 
tain lithographer once did, two full-rigged ships 
with a vast crowd of people in boats waving fare- 
wells, or the imaginary rocks and high lands 
which exist on canvas, but not in reality. It is 
more than probable that the picture painted by 
the Cuyps, father and son, gives the exact facts. 



16G WESTWARD HO! 

This painting, small in size, superb in color, and 
lively in detail, represents, with the usual Dutch 
realism, a gay horse and horseman, the inevi- 
table little dog, a Diana-like huntress, with boy 
carrying her birds, arms, and case, in the fore- 
ground, and a group of sheds or huts, serving 
as storehouses for cargoes and naval goods, at the 
end of a quay. It gives no hint of any island 
such as now fronts Delfshaven, and which one sees 
as he enters or leaves Rotterdam on the steamers 
of the Dutch or HoUand-Ameiica line. The 
buildings were not splendid affairs of masonry, 
brick, and iron, as to-day. The woodcuts and 
paintings of the period depict them as they were. 
In garb of dark or brown clothes of the rigid 
style and cut of English Puritans, with high 
and wide-rimmed black hats, with ruifs around 
their necks, a company of men numbering a dozen 
or so, with a boy or two, are walking down toward 
the end of the pier. A big Dutch porter-woman 
in front and a porter-man at the rear carry big 
bundles for them. Three or four of the party 
have muskets, and one, a short, doughty figure, 
with his legs covered with long high cordovan 
leather boots, holds his arms akimbo and wears 
a sword. In the middle, arm in arm with the 
mate or captain, both of whom are dressed not as 
Puritans, but as ship folk, is a man with a round 
or melon-shaped cap, such as clergymen wore in 
those days. This is not Elder Brewster, who 



WESTWARD HO! 167 

probably wore no special costume, and who was 
then, as we think, hiding in England, but the 
Rev. John Robinson. About the cabins or store- 
houses on the shore are more emigrants, and 
among the shipping to the left, beside the tri- 
color Dutch flags on the vessels sailing, or about 
to sail, is a heavily masted pinnace, lying on the 
low but rising tide, apparently of about sixty tons 
burden. Out of her sides are poked the noses 
of three cannons. On board are many people, 
among whom are gayly dressed English sailors. 
Though the Dutch flag flies conspicuously, yet 
toward the bow is carved the beast best known 
in English heraldry. Tliis rampant red lion, the 
shape and rig of the vessel, its abundance of 
color, and the gay dress of the crew tell of an 
English ship of the model of Elizabethan or 
Jacobean times. 

Evidently the situation here is as usual with 
the Pilgrim company. The women and children 
and most of the party are already on board, and 
the leading men, Robinson, Bradford, Standish, 
and others, are the last to attend to details and 
to embark. The tide is rising, but much shore 
space is yet exposed that is to be covered at flood. 

Before the main body of the resolute voyagers 
parted from their friends there were farewells, 
with sighs, and sobs, and prayers, and tears gush- 
ing from every eye, and pithy speeches piercing 
every heart. Some of the people of Delfshaven 



168 WESTWARD HO! 

who stood by on the quay, moved with sympathy, 
could not refrain from tears. These English 
people in the pioneer ship were going out, as 
they thought, to New Netherland, to the wild 
country across the Atlantic, and this time little 
Delfshaven had a scene such as was common at 
the Weepers' Tower in metropolitan Amsterdam. 
Long afterwards, when Winslow wrote of the 
incident, lie said that the memory of the first Pil- 
grims' parting (for the several other ships which 
reached Plymouth later doubtless sailed from 
Delfshaven) was still fresh among the people of 
this port on the Maas. 

The tide, which waits for no man, had risen ; 
Robinson and the few friends who had come on 
board must disembark. So falling on his knees, 
and they all with him, with watery cheeks, their 
pastor commended them with most fervent prayers 
to the Lord for his blessing. These were English- 
men who were not afraid to shed tears. Before 
the ship passed out of the haven into the river, 
the armed men in the company " gave them a 
volley of small shot and [the sailors fired] three 
pieces of ordnance." Then lifting up their hands 
one to another, that is, waving farewells, the ship 
moved out on the bosom of the Maas, sailing over 
water where now is solid land, then down the 
river and past the Hook of Holland into the Ger- 
man Ocean. The Pilgrim church was now half 
on land and half on sea. 




HOMES AND lOURNEVS OF THE PILGRIMS 



WESTWARD HO! 169 

To-day, as the passengers on the Dutch steam- 
ers of the Netherlands-American Steam Naviga- 
tion Company enter or leave Rotterdam, they may 
easily see, while on the Maas River, the exact 
place whence the Speedwell sailed out, for the 
sluice piercing the island in the centre enables 
one to look into and up the very canal and at the 
street and quays whence the departure took place. 

The Speedwell, leaving Delfshaven on Satur- 
day, the 1st of August, might have joined the 
Mayflower at Southampton on the following 
Wednesday, August 5. Had the two ships been 
able to sail promptly, the united company could 
have reached the Hudson River region in time to 
be well housed before winter. It was not so 
to be. 

After a joyful welcome and mutual congratula- 
tions from their English friends, including jjrob- 
ably Elder Brewster, the Leyden people fell to 
parley about their business and how to dispatch 
it with the best expedition. Then their troubles 
broke out afresh, for they were vexed about the 
stipulations, Weston having changed the original 
agreement. The Speedwell people would not 
agree with the new conditions without the con- 
sent of those left behind in Leyden, and, indeed, 
they had been charged not to do so. At this 
Weston was angry, and told them to " stand on 
their own legs," and went off in a huff: "and 
whereas there wanted well near one hundred 



170 WESTWAED HO! 

pounds to clear things at their going away ; he 
would not take order to disburse a penny ; but 
let them shift as they could." So the Pilgrims 
were obliged to sell off three or four score firkins 
of butter, which fortunately was something of 
which they had enough and to spare. 

A more agreeable incident at Southampton was 
the engagement of a cooper, who was none other 
than John Alden. He was a hearty, healthy, and 
handsome young fellow. As Paul found his Luke 
at Troas, so Bradford met at Southampton his 
future companion and helper of unfailing fidelity. 

Ale or beer being then part of daily diet, a 
cooper was indispensable. Furthermore, no ves- 
sel carrying kegs or barrels could leave port with- 
out giving surety to import into England as much 
timber for staves, then called " clapboard," as 
had been used in making the kegs or barrels ex- 
ported. The Pilgrim ships could not have sailed 
without a cooper, for the law was explicit. Part 
of the statute of Parliament passed in 1543 
reads : — 

" Every Artificer of the Mystery of Coopers 
may take, for every Beer Barrel by him sold, x. d. 
and for every Beer Kilderkin, vi. d. Whosoever 
shall carry Beer beyond Sea, shall find Sureties 
to the Customers of that Port, to bring in Clap- 
board meet to make so much Vessel as he shall 
carry forth." 

We shall see that the first load of merchandise 



WESTWARD HO! 171 

sent home from America by the Pilgrims consisted 
largely of staves, or " clapboards." 

With a governor and two or three assistants 
for each ship, for good order and the proper 
use of provisions, which the shipmasters desired 
and agreed with, they sailed away. The May- 
flower was by far the better provisioned, equipped, 
and armed ship of the two, but, as usual, the noble- 
hearted leaders went on board the Speedwell. 
Then, most probably because the rascally captain 
crowded sail on the overmasted Speedwell, al- 
though she had been twice examined and trimmed 
at much cost at Southampton, she was found, 
after a day or two, to be unseaworthy. Accord- 
ing to Cushman, she was " as open and leaky as 
a sieve " and in danger of sinking. The captains 
consulting together, and being near the coast of 
Devon, they put in at the mouth of the Dart 
River, though they lost thereby a fair wind, and 
the poor Pilgrims had to pay the expenses of the 
stay of ten days at Dartmouth. 

Thoroughly searched from stem to stern, the 
Speedwell's leaks were found and mended. Then 
they put to sea again on August 23 with good 
hopes, expecting no more hindrances ; but when 
well out on the Atlantic, Captain Reynolds de- 
clared that the Speedwell must bear up or sink 
at sea. Since no special leak could be found, it 
was judged that the trouble was on account of 
the general weakness of the ship. So back they 



172 WESTWABD HO! 

went to Plymouth, where they had to stay some 
time. While there, they were treated very kindly 
by the people of the free church, forming what is 
now the Grange Street Chapel, the Mayflower 
meanwhile lying off the Barbican. 

Plymouth was not then, as it is now, guarded 
and defended by a massive breakwater of ma- 
soniy, but only an open roadstead. In time of 
heavy storms the vessels anchored close together 
were apt to be knocked to pieces, one against the 
other, or dashed from the crest of the wave to 
the ground. Fortunately it was fine weather dur- 
ing the Pilgrims' stay. The Speedwell was sent 
back to London, and, being remasted, became a 
seaworthy vessel, as has been said. The INIay- 
flower was to go alone. They stowed on board 
from the Speedwell whoever and whatever the 
Mayflower could take. Since none but volunteers 
were wanted to cross the Atlantic, those discon- 
tented or fearful, least useful or most unfit to 
bear liArdsliips, — some twenty in number, — went 
back to London. 

Thus after delays and disappointments enough 
to appall the stoutest spirits, the voyage began, 
all being compact together in one ship. The 
Mayflower became a floating bethel, and this 
company of Christians the church on the sea. 
Sail was set in a prosperous wind. At first they 
enjoyed fair weather. When starting from Ley- 
den, they had hoped to be in the new world, their 



WESTWARD 110! 173 

third home, before frost ; but when in mid-ocean 
the winds were contrary. The equinoctial storms 
burst upon them. By this time the Pilgrim lead- 
ers, rendered suspicious by their many disappoint- 
ments at the hands of rascally men, gathered from 
the mutterings of the sailors that the ship was 
unseaworthy. In the gale she was strained so 
badly that one of the main beams amidships was 
bowed and cracked, so that it looked as if the 
Mayflower would go to pieces in mid-ocean, or 
at least that they would have to turn back once 
more. They even entered into serious consulta- 
tion with the captain and mates whether they 
should not, after all, retrace their course, rather 
than cast themselves into a desperate and inevi- 
table peril. With the shipmen, it was a question 
between money and life, to lose their contract 
and wages, or to hazard their lives too desper- 
ately. 

After considering all phases of the question, 
the ship's officers, trusting their ship and know- 
ing her to be firm under the water, believed that 
with proper repairs, and without too heavy a press 
of sail, they would make the voyage in safety. 

Fortunately one of the passengers had brought 
out of Holland, where, at Delft especially, the 
natives were famous for ship hardware, a great 
iron screw. This was probably a " lifting jack," 
or " jackscrew," called in Dutch a domme hracht, 
or vijzeL As cannon were invented before guns 



1 74 WESTWARD . HO ! 

or pistols, so the vijzel was a forerunner of the 
monkey-wrench. The same people who invented 
the ship's camel invented this, the shijj's crutch. 
Though not usually found on English vessels at 
that time, lifting jacks were common on Dutch 
ships, and were used for the very purpose to 
which this " great screw " of the passenger from 
Leyden was now put ; that is, to force the dis- 
located beam up and back into place. 

This bit of iron turned the scale of decision, 
and saved to the world — New England. Both 
the carpenter and the captain agreed that when 
raised into its place, and a post put under it and 
set firm into the lower deck, and otherwise bound 
and buckled together, the timber would be suf- 
ficiently secure to remove all cause for anxiety. 
This work was done, and thereafter they had no 
further trouble. Furthermore, by calking the 
decks and upper works there would be no great 
danger from the waves, though by the straining 
of the ship in the storm the water still came down 
into the cabins and below deck, keeping the 
wretched passengers wet and cold. 

In sundry of these storms the seas were so high 
that they could not bear a knot of sail, but for 
days together were forced " to hull ; " that is, 
they drifted at the mercy of the wind, or went 
" scudding under bare poles," while the company 
was fastened below decks, shivering, seasick, for- 
lorn. In the foul air were bred the germs of 



WESTWARD HO! 175 

that quick consumption of which so many, when 
on land, were soon to die. 

It was during one of these storms that a lively- 
young fellow named John Rowland, coming from 
below the hatches out on deck, was, in the roll 
of the ship, thrown into the sea. Providentially, 
at the same time the topsail halyard happened to 
have broken loose from its belaying pin and was 
trailing in the sea, and John caught hold of it. 
In Bradford's words, " He was sundry fathoms 
underwater." He held on till "he was hauled up 
by the same rope to the brim of the water," and 
then with a boat-hook was got into the ship again 
and his life saved. Young Howland was some- 
what the worse for his adventure, but lived to be 
a signer of the immortal compact at Cape Cod, 
useful in church and commonwealth, and the an- 
cestor of many families. 

A sailor, proud of his strength and health, 
made himself very disagreeable by swearing at 
the poor seasick passengers, saying he hoped to 
cast one half of them into the sea. Before the 
voyage was half over, this hearty wretch was 
struck with disease, and " he was himself the first 
that was thrown overboard." We wonder from 
the description Bradford gives whether he was 
a hard drinker and died of delirium tremens. 

William Button, who was probably a medical 
student and assistant of the doctor, Samuel 
Fuller, died on November 16, and his body was 



176 WESTWARD HO! 

committed to the deep. Bradford says nothing 
about any religious exercises, such as are often 
so impressive on seaboard on committal of a body 
to the deep. The Puritans cared next to nothing 
about ceremonies over a corpse whether at wave 
or grave. In their reaction against priestcraft 
they wei'e on principle opposed to all mortuary 
ritual. Theirs was a religion of life, not of death. 
The loss of Dr. Fuller's assistant was made up 
by the birth at sea of a baby, born of Stephen 
Hopkins and his wife Elizabeth, and named 
Oceanus. There were one hundred and two 
people in the Pilgrim company when they left 
Plymouth the second time. Early in December 
Peregrine White was born, making the total 
number of individuals on the register of the 
Mayflower company, between old and new Plym- 
outh, one hundred and four, seventy-five males 
and twenty-nine females. Among the adults were 
twenty-four heads of households, eighteen wives, 
thirteen sons or male relatives, seven daughters 
or other female relatives, fourteen male servants, 
one female servant, and fifteen single men, making 
ninety-two in all. There were also nine boys 
and three girls. Of the ship's officers, Jones was 
the captain and Coppiu a pilot. 



CHAPTER XIV 

THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 

If the Mayflower had started out with a pilot 
who had been inside Sandy Hook, her passengers' 
would probably have had no difficulty in reach- 
ing their desired haven and of coming- to fertile 
land. However, it is probable that with the ques- 
tion of a pilot the Pilgrims had no more to do 
than with choosing the other officers of the ship, 
all of whom were furnished by their hard masters, 
the Merchant Adventurers. 

That part of the coast first sighted was the 
best-known point between Nova Scotia and Flor- 
ida. Eastern Massachusetts had already been 
explored by men of three nations, Samuel Cham- 
plain, John Smith, and Adrian Block, and visited 
by not a few fishermen, traders, and English 
slavers, or kidnapers, of Indians. Smith had 
in 1614 made a map, which these "humorists," 
as Smith called the Pilgrims, had taken instead 
of his advice. He had put a good many English 
names, fanciful and otherwise, upon his map, 
such as London, Cheviot Hills, Edinburgh, Cam- 
bridge, and so on, though some of these still 
hold their own, such as Plymouth, Charles River, 



178 THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 

and Cape Ann. Cape Cod was variously named : 
by BloL'k, Flat Cape ; by Smith, Cape James ; 
and by later comers, Cape Malabar. Champlain 
had sprinkled some French names on his maps. 
Block, who rounded the cape and crossed to Na- 
hant, and of whose fame Block Island is a monu- 
ment, had given the name of Nassau to Buzzard's 
Bay, and others, now obliterated or anglicized, 
such as Rhode Island for Rood Eilandt. Housa- 
tonic is the Dutch Woesten Hoek or Wilderness 
Place. The Dutch claims were based on the 
right of discovery. 

Had the Mayflower been steered due west, she 
would have reached the American coast at or 
near the place of John Cabot's landfall. There 
have been many theories, some ingenious, others 
absurd, as to why Cape Cod was made and held 
to. Most of the notions entertained are modern 
after-thoughts, and some are spawned out of dis- 
graceful prejudices. Probably the real reason 
lay, not in the total depravity of the captain, or 
of the pilot, or of the Dutch, but in the Gulf 
Stream, that vast and shifting ocean current 
whose very existence was then unknown. As we 
now know, the channel of this river of indigo- 
blue warm water frequently changes, swerving 
miles east or west. Its vagaries could therefore 
easily puzzle even an experienced pilot, and drag 
the Mayflower northward. When Verrazzano set 
his compass for Florida, he also, and much to his 



THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 179 

surprise, made landfall at Cape Cod. Neither 
Jones, nor Coppiu, nor the Dutch then knew any- 
thing of the Gulf Stream, which was first discov- 
ered and described by Dr. Benjamin Franklin. 

Furthermore, like the French, and Captain 
John Smith, the English pilot had the idea, from 
which Englishmen were not wholly free till the 
eighteenth century, of finding gold mines or the 
mythical Indian city, called Norumbega. Quite 
probably this theory also had its influence in 
bringing the Mayflower to Cape Cod instead of 
Sandy Hook. 

Geologists who have inquired concerning the 
ages past tell us that the eastern end of Massa- 
chusetts, shaped like an arm with an elbow and 
fist, was fashioned by the forces of glacier and 
floe-bergs, wind, ice, and waves. These hollowed 
out Boston Harbor, and ground and shaped its 
many islands, depositing the detritus in the form 
of a sandy hook or bar, which is now Barnstable 
County. Sandy Hook, named by the Dutch, is 
another instance of matter redeposited as a bar, 
after a bay has been scoured out. 

It was at break of the day on the 10th of Novem- 
ber that the shore was first spied. The sea-weary 
eyes of the passengers were comforted at " espe- 
cially seeing so goodly a land, and wooded to the 
brink of the sea." It was probably to the north- 
ern extremity of the cape that they came. After 
deliberation among themselves and with Captain 



180 THE COMPACT AT CAPE COB 

Jones, they tacked about and resolved to stand 
for the southward. " But after they had sailed 
that course about half the day, they fell among 
dangerous shoals and roaring breakers [probably 
at the Pollock Rip], and they were so far iutan- 
gled therewith, as they conceived themselves in 
great danger ; and the wind shrinking upon them 
withal, they resolved to bear up again for the 
Cape ; and thought themselves happy to get out 
of these dangers before night overtook them, as 
by God's good providence they did." 

Evidently to these landsmen, crowded together 
almost like slaves in a slave vessel, poorly fed, 
enfeebled by their long confinement and bad air, 
barely escaping the dangers of foundering in the 
stormy mid-ocean, and now again in peril from 
treacherous shallows and currents which nearly 
caused shipwreck, it seemed in retrospect as 
though " a sea voyage was an inch of hell." 

Furthermore the ship folk gave them clearly to 
understand that they must hurry up and get a 
place to settle, for the Mayflower would not 
stir from her good anchorage, arid captain and 
crew were bound to keep enough victuals for 
themselves both while there and while on the 
way back to England. "Yea, it was muttered 
by some that if they got not a place in time, they 
would turn them and their goods ashore and 
leave them." 

The Pilgrim Fathers having first been plain 



THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 181 

farmers, and then mechanics in a strange coun- 
try, and several times passengers by inhmd wa- 
ters, salt sea, canal and ocean, now expected to 
become explorers, but " order is Heaven's first 
law." Before this work of spying out the land 
could begin, there was another question to settle, 
that of government. 

They inherited the tradition of English free- 
dom, but they had been nobly reinforced also by 
residence in a free republic, where the spirit of 
the churches was democratic and where that of the 
city and state was republican. They had seen be- 
fore their own eyes in Holland what a large share 
the people had in the making of government. 
Above all, believing that even common men led 
by the spirit of God were kings and priests unto 
God, they had formed a little republic of their 
own. Their church life, theoretically democratic, 
was also practically so in large measure ; though 
here, as in every form of social order on earth, 
the men of light and leading were powerful in 
influence, and able to overawe those of lesser 
ability, and move them for mutual good. Now 
that they were inside Cape Cod, instead of Sandy 
Hook, and their patent, which they had, conferred 
no rights in New England, since the Virginia 
Company had none there, the Mayflower was 
an " undocumented vessel " on the hio-h seas. 
Furthennore there were symptoms of anarchy 
among some baser spirits in the party, which 
must be instantly met and curbed. 



182 THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 

We must not forget tliat this Mayflower 
company was not the sifted and select party 
that had come from Leyden. There were a few 
people, as Bradford says, " shuffled " in upon 
them, who were probably unmitigated scoundrels. 
There were others also, hired laborers, who had 
not been trained and tempered in righteousness. 
These, so soon as the ship turned back from the 
southward, possibly, also, urged on by the sailors, 
were " not well affected to unity and concord," 
but " gave some appearance of faction." Be- 
tween the two extremes - — of foolishly indiscrimi- 
nate laudation of " the one hundred and one " at 
banquets on Forefathers' Day, and Palfrey's dic- 
tum that " eleven (of the Pilgrims) are favorably 
known, the rest are either known unfavorably, 
or else only by name" — the truth probably lies 
midway. 

Evidently, then, there was a necessity for some 
form of government, to be agreed ixpon, which 
the majority would adhere to and the minority 
must obey. So before undertaking exploration 
or anything on land, the men who had, according 
to the authority of the Bible, formed a church, — 
far better authority than popes or bishops or 
kings could give, — proceeded to form a govern- 
ment. This they had no difficulty in doing, for 
their " large patent " obtained for them by Sir 
Edwin Sandys permitted the leaders of " plan- 
tations " to make all necessary laws and forms of 



THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 183 

authority, provided they held loyally to the sover- 
eign o£ England, and were not Opposed to the 
laws of the realm. It was under this documented 
authorization that the Mayflower men elected, 
or rather confirmed, a governor and made the 
Cape Cod Compact, subscribing their names as 
subjects of the king of Great Britain. They 
formed themselves into a civil body politic for 
carrying out the purposes of planting a colony in 
the northern parts of Virginia. They promised 
all due submission to such just and equal laws as 
should be thought most meet and convenient 
for the general good. 

The effective Mayflower company at Cape 
Cod consisted of seventy-three males and twenty- 
nine females. Of thirty-four adult males con- 
stituting the colony proper, eighteen had wives 
and fourteen of the eighteen had children under 
twenty -one, — twenty boys and eight girls. Of 
these thirty-four men, — the real nucleus of the 
colony, — probably all but four were from Leyden. 
But in addition to the householders and their 
heads, there was the uncertain element of ser- 
vants, sailors, and craftsmen, large enough to be 
dangerous if not properly disposed and influenced. 
There was, indeed, in the Mayflower a major- 
ity of noble souls trained and tempered by long 
years of friendship and mutual joj^s and dangers. 
These, as Englishmen duly empowered by their 
charter, did what any sensible men of England, 



184 THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 

Scotland, or Holland would have done at that 
time under like environment. 

Thus, without looking at this document in the 
transfiguring glow of after-dinner oratory in later 
centuries, we may still see in it a noble framework 
of government, simple but efficient. It is not 
free from the stilted language and even the fic- 
tions of law which belong to the age. We read 
the phrase " dread sovereign lord," so common in 
those times, and we also find James called " the 
King of France," which, since the loss of Calais 
in January, 1558, was almost as ridiculous a term 
then as it would be now. It was sixty -two years 
behind the facts. As to King James being a 
"defender of the faith," this must have been to 
the Pilgrims a grim joke. The strong points of 
the document are, the sentences " in the name 
of God, Amen," and " having undertaken . . . 
to plant the first colony in the northern parts of 
Virginia ; we do by these presents solemn and 
mutually in the presence of God and of one an- 
other covenant and combine ourselves together 
into a civil body politic." It was signed by forty- 
one men, out of the seventy-five male passengers 
then on board the Mayflower. Of the remain- 
ing twenty-four males, thirteen were sons and 
minors whose fathers' signatures answered for 
their own. Nine others who did not subscribe 
were male servants. These were probably too 
ill to sign or be interested in the matter, for all 



THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 185 

of tliem except one soon clied, nor is it likely 
that they could write. This compact of the peo- 
ple, for the people, and by the people was ex- 
pressed in a truly democratic document, and 
furnished the basis of one of the best governments 
that could be advised. 

To the boys and girls, to say nothing of the 
adults, the first view of their new home was de- 
lightful. All around were the "trees of the 
Lord," such as those which they had seen in Hol- 
land and which had given that land of primeval 
forests its name. Tfee ship lay inside the good 
harbor wherein a thousand sail of ships may 
safely anchor. They noticed that the timber 
came down to the water's edge ; oaks, pine, juni- 
per, and the sassafras, which was then esteemed 
extremely valuable in medicine, besides other 
sweet woods, could be discerned. So the first 
odors that greeted them were not of turf, or from 
burning hearth fires, — which to one approach- 
ing Ireland or England has such a suggestion of 
human habitations, — but the balsamic odors of 
the forest, of rude nature. 

Now, also, they began to see their wretched 
poverty, how poorly they were prepared to make 
money or obtain food, or even to sustain life. 
There was the greatest store of fowl that they 
had ever seen. There were also whales, playing 
close to the ship, which, had they only possessed 
harpoons and ropes, they could have captured, 



186 THE COMPACT AT CAPE COD 

and, trying out the oil, have secured what would 
now be sixty or eighty thousand dollars' worth of 
bone and oil. Whale-fleet, now "Wellfleet," still 
tells the story of past abundance. The Pilgrims 
tried to fish for cod, but found none, despite the 
name of the cape, for it was not the season. In- 
deed, all the time that the Mayflower lay there, 
seven weeks, they got no salt-water fish, but only 
a few little ones on the shore. They tried to 
eat the fat coarse mussels, but in their gastric 
condition such meat only made them ill. 

They could not get nearer than three-quarters 
of a mile to the shore, for the waters were very 
shallow. When they sent sixteen armed men 
ashore to get firewood and fresh water, these had 
to wade through the freezing cold brine, because 
the anonymous shallop had been sagged out of 
shape by men sleeping in it during the voyage, and 
its seams were all opened. The sand hills were 
found to be much like the dunes of Holland, but 
with this difference, — that in many places below 
the overlying wind-blown sand lay excellent 
black earth, enriched by ages of growth and of 
fallen leaves and vegetable matter. The first 
product of the land which they used was juniper, 
or cedar wood, which they burned while on the 
ship, and it smelled very sweet and strong. 



CHAPTER XV 

IN THEIR THIRD HOME 

After the Sabbath of November 23, practical 
life in the New World began on Monday, the 24th 
of November, by the women going ashore to wash 
clothes, which it had not been possible to do on 
board the ship, where all the fresh water in store 
was precious. We may imagine that the women 
had plenty to do, when they thus began the great 
American institution of " Wash-day Monday." 
They had been one hundred and thirty-three days 
on board ship since they left Delfshaven. 

The " juniper," or red cedar, which made the 
aromatic fire under the wash kettles, has long 
since disappeared before the axe. The pool of 
fresh water, so useful for their laundry, is now 
submerged in Provincetown Harbor. 

Thus began, also, in the cold raw air, the colds 
and coughs which put so many of them into their 
graves within a few weeks. One of the most 
pathetic facts about the first winter in their third 
home is the almost entire destruction of the wives 
of the Pilgrims, fourteen out of eighteen dying 
off, while four of the twenty-four households were 
entirely obliterated. 



188 IN THEIR THIRD HOME 

Meanwhile the stronger men were impatient to 
spy out the country, especially since there seemed 
to be a river opening into the main land. Miles 
Standish, the soldier, is now first mentioned in 
Pilgrim literature. He appears in view as cap- 
tain of the exploring expedition, which was " rather 
permitted than approved." Of the sixteen picked 
men, all had swords and corselets. Their fire- 
arms were partly old-fashioned matchlocks, and 
partly " snaphances," which is a Dutch word for 
snap-cock guns. Their provisions were crackers 
and cheese, and their medicine a bottle of brandy. 
William Bradford, Stephen Hoj^kins, and Edward 
Tilley formed, with Standish, a council of advice. 

The little company started off in single file, 
marching along the sea at the edge of the woods. 
Well used to ambuscades in the Netherlands, 
Standish was continually on the alert. After 
they had gone about a mile they saw the first 
human beings, five or six in number, with a dog. 
At first they supposed them to be the skipper and 
some of his crew, but soon saw that they were 
natives or Indians, who quickly ran away. Stan- 
dish's party followed them for about ten miles, 
stepping in their trail, and losing sight of them 
after having seen them run up a hill, possibly 
Negro Head. 

By this time night had come. Kindling a fire, 
they set two sentinels and slept on the ground. 
At break of day they resumed their march. 



IN THEIR THIRD HOME 189 

This time they went into the woods (which have 
long ago disappeared) through boughs and bushes, 
which damaged their armor lacings. They found 
no fresh water or food or Indian houses. At 
about ten o'clock they reached a deep valley 
marked with the little paths or tracks made by 
Indian feet, and there also they saw a deer and 
found springs. Heartily glad and long tired of 
the water kept in the ship's tanks, tliey sat down 
at or near what is now East Harbor, and drank 
fresh water with as much delight as ever they 
had drunk wine or beer in all their lives. Goins; 
southward they came to the shore of the bay and 
kindled a fire, as a signal to the Mayflower's 
people. After seeing a pond of fresh water, with 
many vines and wild fowl and much sassafras, 
they found about fifty acres of old maize-land 
which had been used by the Indians. Following 
the seashore awhile, and again moving inland, 
they saw Indian graves and a stubble field. 
Walnut-trees, strawberries, and grapevines were 
also noticed. The ruins of an old house, evi- 
dently the hut of European sailors, aroused their 
curiosity, for in it was a ship's kettle brought out 
of Europe, together with three or four bushels of 
corn, some of the ears of which were yellow, some 
red, and some mixed with blue. This maize 
with grains of various tints was a new and won- 
derful thing to these people, who had never, ex- 
cept perhaps in the Leyden museum, seen any- 



190 IN THEIR THIBI) HOME 

thing like it. While thus eagerly occupied, they 
were all, as on every occasion, very alert, posting 
sentinels in a ring. 

At night they came back to the fresh-water 
pond, reared a barricade against the wind, and 
set a watch. The sentinels stood with matches 
burning all night long during the rain. Next 
morning as they further wandered, Bradford, the 
file-closer, was caught, but not hurt, in a deer 
trap, which some Indian had made by bending 
down a sapling held with a noose, strewing acorns 
underneath the trigger. No doubt Bradford's 
comrades had a hearty laugh over the mishap, 
out of which he got so easily. They scared up 
partridges, wild geese, and ducks, but bagged no 
game. They even saw three deer ; and Bradford 
cracks a joke to the effect that one buck on the 
shoulder is worth three in the woods. When 
within sight of their ship they iired their guns, 
and the longboat came to fetch them back, and 
there was mutual gladness. The corn was held 
for seed, and the Indian noose made of wild hemp 
kept for imitation, both to be paid for, should the 
owners be found. 

While the shallop was being repaired, time was 
spent in sawing timber, fashioning tool handles, 
and otherwise preparing for the making of homes. 
On Monday, the 27th of November, thirty-four 
men, including Captain Jones, the commander, 
and nine sailors, set out on a new expedition. It 



IN THEIR THIRD HOME 191 

blew and snowed all day and night, so that some 
of the men " took the original of their death 
here." Sailing into the river which they had dis- 
covered, they found it was not navigable for 
ships. It must have been a delightful variation 
to their monotonous fare, when on the niglit of 
Tuesday they had three fat geese and six ducks 
for supper. These they ate with soldiers' appe- 
tites. 

The next day, Wednesday, they left the hilly 
region and turned toward the Indian granary. 
By a lucky shot two geese were killed. Launch- 
ing the Indian canoe, they crossed over, seven or 
eight at a time. Digging in Corn Hill they ob- 
tained about ten bushels of maize. The next day 
they came to a mound, which they dug open, finding 
two skeletons, of a man and of a child, wrapped 
up in bundles and packed in red powder. On 
the man's head was fine yellow hair. The child 
had strings of shells wrapped around the limbs, 
and there were toys near by. Whether, as has 
been supposed, this was the body of a Norseman, 
or whether the finely carved and painted board 
with fleur-de-lis upon it pointed to the loss on the 
coast, in 1616, of a French ship, is not known. 
The wreck would explain the numerous European 
relics found by the Pilgrims. It is known that 
one white survivor had married in the tribe and 
had had a son. The child was probably arrayed 
for burial by a sorrowing Indian mother. The 



192 IN THEIR THIRD HOME 

Pilgrims scrupulously covered up the grave- 
mound. They found also two empty wigwams, 
into which two sailors from the ship or shallop 
had also entered. In addition to the Indian bas- 
kets and im23lements, were deer's heads and hoofs, 
eagle claws, seeds, food, material to make mats, 
and a European bucket. To all these things the 
exj)lorers helped themselves freely, intending to 
pay for them when they could. Toward night, 
December 10, they boarded the shallop and 
reached the ship. 

After a long discussion as to their place of set- 
tlement, they decided not to seek another distant 
harbor, but to make some discovery within the 
bay, and there settle, as Coppin advised them to 
do. The number of males on the ship was in- 
creased by the birth of Peregrine (Pilgrim) 
White, who lived until the year 1704. 

All this time, it must have been hard work to 
keep so many small boys out of mischief, nor was 
it entirely possible to do this, cooped up as they 
were on shipboard. On the 15th of December, 
Tuesday, young Francis Billington, while his 
father was away, had got hold of some gunpow- 
der. Besides shooting off the musket once or 
twice, he made squibs, and enjoyed himself as the 
small boy loves to do with things dangerous. 
Not content with this, having found a loaded 
fowling piece, he discharged it in the cabin, where 
there was a little barrel of powder about half full, 



IN THEIR THIRD HOME 193 

which had probably been opened to supjily the 
cartridges or bandoleers of the explorers. Loose 
powder lay scattered about the cabin, and the fire 
from the muzzle was within four feet of the bunk, 
so that, with many flints and iron things lying 
around, where so many people were crowded to- 
gether, it is a wonder that the ship was not blown 
up. Of this Billington boy and his pranks the 
company were to hear again. 

A third exploring party, consisting of twelve 
Pilgrims and six of the crew, set out on the 16th 
of December in cold, hard weather. While the 
shallop was being rowed with exhausting labor 
clear of Long Point, two of the men became ill 
and one nearly swooned with cold. But once 
clear of the sandy point, they hoisted sail, caught 
the wind, and got into smoother water, though the 
spray froze on their clothes. After some hours 
they landed, made a barricade, built fires, and 
posted sentinels. Four or five miles off they saw 
the smoke of the Indians' fire. The next morn- 
ing twelve explorers spent a fatiguing day on 
land, rejoining the shallop at dark. They were 
very hungry and very faint, but after a little food 
and warmth they went to sleep. At midnight they 
were alarmed by the crying of " foxes," as they 
thought, which were driven off by firing guns. 

The next morning at five o'clock they tried 
their muskets. These men were of the sort that 
feared God and kept their powder dry. They 



194 IN THEIR THIRD HOME 

had prayer, and after eating started again. Now 
came the first meeting between these men of 
iron and those still living in the stone age. Sud- 
denly in the winter dawn they heard the same 
cry which had disturbed them at midnight. It 
was an Indian warwhoop. The next moment one 
of the men, being out from the camp, ran in, 
crying, " They are men, Indians, Indians ! " and 
then a shower of arrows came flying among them. 
These missiles were tipj^ed with deer horn, eagle 
claws, or brass. Fortunately none of the white 
men were hit, though the shafts came very close 
on every side, and some of their coats hung up on 
the barricade were shot through and through. 

The whites ran to the beach to get their arms 
and armor. Captain Miles Standish had a snap- 
cock gun, and he and a comrade fired. By this 
time Bradford and another man were ready, there 
being only four at that moment fit for combat, 
but Standish ordered them to withhold fire until 
they could take aim. It looked as if a battle were 
coming on. The men near the fire called to their 
comrades in the shallop, asking how it was, and 
heard three shots from them and a call for a fire- 
brand to light their match cord. One of the men 
at the camp seized a burning fagot and rushed 
with it to the boat, to give the men a light. Mean- 
while terrific Indian yells sounded in their ears. 
By this time all the company had got their arms. 
The Indian chief was behind a tree and let fly 



IN THEIR THIRD HOME 195 

three arrows at short range, which the white men 
dodged or avoided by stooping down. The chief 
stood his ground even when some one fired three 
shots of a musket at him. On the fourth shot, 
the Indiaii yelled, and then all the red men fled. 
Warily leaving six men to keep the shallop, the 
Pilgrim squad pursued the savages for a quarter 
of a mile, but did not come up with them. It was 
supposed from the sound that there were thirty 
or forty warriors, but in the morning twilight 
they could not easily be seen among the trees, 
while on the other hand the white men were 
readily discerned by the light of the fire. They 
picked up eighteen of the arrows to be sent to 
England by the captain. Then they thanked 
God, took courage, and went on their journey, 
calling this place " The First Encounter." This 
battlefield was at Nauset, which Champlain had 
visited a few years before. It is now called East- 
ham, and the Indians were the Nausites. It seems 
wonderful that with so many arrows and bullets 
flying through the air no one was hurt. 

The next day was snowy and rainy with high 
winds. The rudder hinges having broken, two 
men had to steer the boat with oars. The mast 
split in three pieces, and the danger was great. 
Late in the afternoon the}' found an island and a 
sandy place good for the shallop to ride safe and 
secure for the night, during which sentinels kept 
watch. As Clark, the captain's mate, was first 
to land, thev named it Clark's Island. 



196 m THEIR THIRD HOME 

On the 20th of December, it being the Sab- 
bath, they rested. On Monday they sounded the 
harbor, which they found very good for their 
shipjaing, and then made the landing, possibly on 
the rock now so famous. They found close at 
hand maize fields, running streams, and a hill for 
defense — all the requisites for a successful settle- 
ment. This was the scene of their future home, 
" a place very good for situation." It was no 
other than the place named Plymouth by Captain 
John Smith. This is the date of " Forefathers' 
Day," which began to be annually celebrated in 
1769. 

The next day, Tuesday, they made straight for 
the ship, carrying the good news to their people, 
who were greatly comforted. On the 25th of 
December the Mayflower hoisted anchor to make 
the run across the bay to Plymouth ; but unable 
to do so on accoimt of contrary winds, she put 
back again towards Cape Cod. On Saturday, 
the 26th, the wind being fair, they came safely 
into Plymouth Harbor. Other visits on shore 
and explorations were made, and it was shown 
that here was a good site, rich in all kinds of 
sea food, with abundance and variety of timber 
and herbs, and having a fairly fertile soil. 

After calling on God for guidance, the final 
council was held on the morning of Wednesday, 
December 30. They decided by a majority vote 
to settle at Plymouth, where there were cleared 



IN THEIR THIBD HOME 197 

land, plenty of fresh water, a hill on which a fort 
could be built and made, like the Burg at Ley- 
den, a place whence to view the surrounding 
country. 

The Pilgrim settlement was in a certain respect 
copied after that in Ley den. The company was 
arranged into households, the single men being 
required to join some family, so that fewer houses 
might be required. Not given at this time to mere 
words or much sentiment, they laid out a name- 
less thoroughfare, first called " The Street," then 
" First Street," " Broad Street " (the name of 
the main sti^eet in Leyden), and finally, in 1823, 
" Leyden Street." In their housekeeping they 
were crowded together, as they had been in the 
city on the Rhine, in their little houses, every 
one of which contained probably an average of 
ten persons. 

Troubled and discouraged with rain and wet, 
storm and snow, they kept on at work, during the 
dark days of late December and the increasing 
cold of early January, losing much time in going 
and coming between ship and shore, for the tide 
waited not for their convenience, and the May- 
flower lay nearly a mile and a half away. They 
had no time to make shingles or to bake tiles, 
such as they lived under in Leyden, so on the 
13th of January parties went out to gather 
thatch wherewith to put something between them- 
selves and the sky. As yet only a few of the men 



198 IN THEIR THIRD HOME 

had seen any human being. Not having any small 
fish-hooks, they caught no fish, and the finding 
of a live herring on the shore was a great event. 
On Monday, the 18th of Januar}^ the shallop was 
sent out, coming back with three seals and a cod- 
fish. On the same day one of the Billingtons, 
having climbed a high tree on a high hill, saw a 
sheet of water. Walking with one of the mas- 
ter's mates, he discovered " Billington Sea," from 
which the town brook issues. 

The idea of calling a jsond a " sea " is old Eng- 
lish, and the use of the word is illustrated in the 
'' sea " of Galilee, as Lake Gennesaret is called. 
This was among the first seen of the two hundred 
ponds which lie in Plymouth township, but it was 
not the source of the Hudson River, as probably 
some of the company then supj^osed. Even until 
near the time of the Revolution, New England 
was supposed by many in Great Britain to be an 
island. It was so referred to even by one of King 
George's high officers. 



CHAPTER XVI 

THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 

On the 19tli of January, the weather being rea- 
sonably fair, the town was laid out, and the plots 
of ground were assigned. The big common house, 
which was to be a rendezvous, church, barracks, 
hospital, and storehouse, was twenty feet square, 
made of hewn logs, pointed with mortar or mud 
in the chinks between the timbers, and thatched. 
The work was slow, for the winter days were 
short, and the rains often made them stop. On 
Friday, the 22d, two men, having gone out for 
thatching material, followed too far their dogs 
that chased the deer, and lost their way in the 
woods. They had no arms except a sickle. They 
had to make their bed on the ground, and were 
kept awake by the roaring of wolves. They 
walked up and down under a tree all the night, 
which was extremely cold, expecting to climb up 
in the branches when the wolves came, though 
these failed to appear. By the next night they 
reached the company, nearly dead with hunger 
and cold. 

As we have seen, there were no " Tylers " in the 
party, but only " Thatchers." Very probably, 



200 THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 

these Leyclen people had not been used to thatch 
and its dangers. We know not what sort of a 
chimney these amateur house-builders had erected, 
or whether there was any ; but the roof of the 
big common house caught on fire. A spark flew 
up into the thatch, which burst into flame, making 
a tremendous blaze. Seen from the ship, the 
people on board supposed that the Indians had 
attacked and burned the place. The house was 
full of bedding. The guns were loaded, with 
powder near at hand. Carver and Bradford lay 
sick at the time, but fortunately they got up 
quickly and saved themselves and the building 
from an explosion. 

Three or four days of sunshine followed, and 
then more rain, but by the 30th a shed was built 
to shelter the goods of the community, which were 
now brought over from the ship. On Sunday, 
January 31, the whole company, being ashore, 
met for divine service in the common house, — 
New England's first public building. Local tra- 
dition declares that Mary Chilton was the first 
woman who stepped on land, and that for her and 
the others the solitary boulder was the landing- 
place. Plymouth Rock began with her its fame. 

On the 14th of February a most tremendous 
storm burst upon them. It knocked the mud out 
of the chinks in the houses, and made the May- 
flower rock in a lively way, for she was now 
empty of her lading and unballasted. Again, the 



THi: FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 201 

house being full of sick people, they were in clan- 
ger from a fire kindled by a spark, though no 
great harm was done. Probably too much birch 
fuel was used. Captain Jones, having killed five 
geese, distributed them among the sick. 

The Indians now appeared, off and on, in such 
numbers that it was necessary to be prepared 
with some kind of defensive organization. So, 
on Saturday, the 27th of February, 1621, a meet- 
ing was called to form a military company. Miles 
Standish was made captain, and given authority 
to command. In the fort the Pilgrim battery 
consisted of four cannon. Hard as must have 
been the work of landing the artillery, it must 
have been harder to drag the two light and two 
heavy pieces up to the top of the hill, where they 
were to be planted in a commanding situation. 
The sailors, however, lent a hand, and reinforced 
Pilgrim muscle. 

Evidently not knowing the New England cli- 
mate, they had begun to sow some garden seeds 
on the 7th of March. On the 13th of March they 
heard thunder for the first time in their new home- 
land. Friday, March 26, 1621, was a fair, warm 
day. While busy with further council about 
military affairs, there came a sudden and delight- 
ful interruption. They heard their own native 
tongue uttered by a savage, who said "Wel- 
come." He was naked, except a fringe of skin 
about his waist, and had a bow and two arrows. 



202 THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 

He was tall and straight, with his black hair hang- 
ing down behind him, and cut on his forehead like 
a bang, and was entirely beardless. He asked for 
beer, but they gave him brandy and some biscuit 
and butter, cheese and pudding, and a piece of 
mallard duck, all of which he was well accustomed 
to, and liked very much. 

This Indian gentleman, for such we must call 
him, being, as he was, from one of the first fami- 
lies of America, and by name Samoset, was also 
a man of culture and travel. He was a chief, a 
native of Pemaquid, where Bristol, Maine, now 
stands. Having come on Captain Dermer's ship 
with another countiyman named Squanto, he 
landed on Cape Cod, where six French fishermen 
had been shipwrecked only six months before the 
Mayflower arrived. Samoset helped to redeem 
two survivors from their savage captors, and 
probably told of that Frenchman from an earlier 
wreck, who, with his half-breed child, had filled the 
grave which the Pilgrim explorers opened. In- 
stead of going back home, Samoset had remained 
in this region, and was now able to tell the Pil- 
grims the history of the land they were to live on, 
and why the Indians were so hostile. English 
slave-traders had in 1614 kidnaped and sold into 
the Spanish galleys twenty-seven natives. Hence 
the red man's desii-e for revenge upon all whites. 
The Pilgrims' tenure of land was not likely to 
be disputed, for there were no other claimants. 



THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 203 

About four years before, a plague had swept off 
all the people in the neighborhood, which was 
called Patuxet. The nearest chief was Massa- 
soit. 

When on Saturday Samoset left, he was given 
a knife, a bracelet, and a ring. He promised to 
return within a night or two, and to bring with 
him some of Massasoit's men, with such beaver- 
skins as they had for barter. 

Samoset came back with most undesirable 
promptness on Sunday. With him were five 
sturdy Indians, whose bodies and legs were more 
or less covered with deer and panther skin. Since 
the Pilgrims wore short, baggy trousers, with stock- 
ings coming to the knees, the Indian leggings 
seemed to them like " Irish trousers," coming 
all the way up to the thighs and waist. In com- 
plexion they resembled the gypsies, whom the 
Plymouth men had seen in England and Holland. 
They had no hair on their faces, which were 
painted according to whim or fashion. The 
coarse black hair on their heads was braided into 
long tresses, banged on their foreheads, or tied up 
over their heads, with a feather or a fox tail hang- 
ing out. In token of peace, they had left their 
bows and arrows a quarter of a mile from the 
town. They ate heartily of the food offered 
them. They gave a specimen of their songs and 
dances. They carried at the waist their rations, 
— some powdered corn in a bag, — and their luxu- 



204 THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 

ries, which were pipes and a tobacco pouch. They 
brought back the tools taken in the woods, where 
the white men had left them. They had three or 
four skins for sale ; but after proper politeness 
shown, it being Sunday, the Pilgrims drove no 
bargain, but got their red friends off. Samoset 
remained, and was furnished with a hat, a pair of 
stockings, shoes, a shirt, and a piece of stuff for 
a loin cloth. 

On three different occasions, while elaborating 
their military business, the Pilgrims had been 
interrupted by the coming of the strange people 
whom they were most likely to meet in combat. 
Again a squad of Indians approached, this time 
apparently whetting their arrows, and rubbing 
their bow-strings as if in defiance ; but when four 
of the white men went over the Town Brook to- 
ward them, they ran away. It was on this day, 
March 31, that the last of the company finally left 
the Mayflower. The carpenter, who had been 
sick for a long time of the scurvy, fitted up the 
shallop, and brought all ashore. No doubt the 
actual prosaic facts of the lauding and the subse- 
quent fancies of poet and painter do not tally. 

The next day, April 1, was also eventful, for 
while at public council they were again visited 
by Samoset, who this time was accompanied by 
Squanto, the only survivor of the Patuxet cap- 
tives that had been kidnaped and carried away 
into slavery by Captain Hunt in 1614. Squanto 




^ ^^^5)^'~w^^^j^rr</ 



THE FIBST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 205 

had been in London, wliere he lived with Master 
John Slaney in Cornhill, and could thei^efore 
speak a little English. Besides bringing a few 
skins to sell and some dried red herring, the pair 
intimated that Massasoit and all his company 
were coming, and, indeed, were near at hand. 
That this was true, was soon proved. In about 
an hour they saw on the top of a hill a band of 
about sixty natives led by Massasoit. The whites 
chose Edward Winslow, who was the diplomatist 
of the company, to signify that they wanted peace 
and trade, and that they would confer with dele- 
gates sent by the Indians. The jDresents sent 
consisted of a knife and a copj^er chain with a 
jewel in it for Massasoit, an ear jewel for his 
brother Quadequina, and a pot of brandy, plenty 
of biscuit, and some butter for the party. 

To these men of the stone age, Winslow made 
a speech in the name of King James, and the in- 
terpreters turned it into Algonquin as well as 
they were able. After Massasoit had eaten and 
drunk, he wanted to buy Winslow's armor and 
sword, which the owner would not sell. Feel- 
ing in good humor after his dinner, Massasoit 
left Winslow as hostage in custody of Quade- 
quina, and with twenty unarmed men came over 
the Town Brook. There he was met by Captain 
Standish and Allerton, with half a dozen men, 
who escorted him to an unfinished house, where 
they placed a rug and cushions. Governor John 



206 THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMEBIC A 

Carver, with drummer, trumpeter, and a few men 
in armor, came in also. After salutations. Car- 
ver called for brandy and drank to Massasoit's 
health, while the red man also drained a " bum- 
per." "• The king " and his followers were also 
given fresh meat. Then followed a treaty of 
peace, which lasted many yeai's. The reds and 
the whites, the men of stone and the men of iron, 
savage and Christian, mutually agreed not to in- 
jure or hurt each other, and to be friends and 
allies in war and peace. 

Squanto, who remained a little while longer, 
made himself very useful to these Englishmen, 
who knew next to nothing about maize or its 
nature. He showed them how to plant the chief 
American staple, by first manuring the ground 
with fish, putting the grain and the ale wives in 
the same hill. He further showed them how 
to hoe the earth around the stalks to secure fat 
ears. By the middle of Af»ril, he said, there 
would be plenty of fish coming up the Town 
Brook, and he also told them where to get other 
provisions. In due time the whites found by 
their own trial and experience that what Squanto 
had told them was true. He also taught them 
just how to catch eels. Going out on the muddy 
shore and treading them out with his feet, he 
caught a mess. Thus, without a trap, hook, or 
net, he provided sea food offhand. These eels 
were fat, sweet, and very nutritious. In many 



THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 207 

other helpful ways the red men were teachers and 
benefactors of the foreigners. Moccasins, snow- 
shoes, birch-bark canoes, and the art of " gir- 
dling " trees and thus quickly opening forest-land 
to sunshine and cultivation, were the great gifts 
of the Indians. 

It was proper for the Plymouth men to return 
the call of Massasoit, to learn more about the 
country and to continue the league of peace. 
For this purpose Governor Carver chose Stephen 
Hopkins and Edward Winslow to go among them. 
Squanto, as the official interpreter, was presented 
with a bright red cotton coat, properly laced. 
This was not a military sign, for the red-coated 
soldier of the British army was not known until 
after the days of the Commonwealtli. The em- 
bassy started on Monday, July 2, at nine in the 
morning, but did not meet Massasoit until far in- 
land, on Wednesday, the 14th of July. The chief 
promised to continue peace and friendship and to 
procure good seed corn for them. Then they all 
lighted their pipes and talked of England and 
King James, who at this time had no wife, and of 
the Frenchmen who came often to Narragansett. 
When they went to bed, which they did without 
any supper, the chief and his squaw lay at one 
end of the couch, which was made of plank with 
a thin mat upon it. Two more of the Indians, 
for want of room, also pressed by and upon the 
Englishmen so that they were worse of their 



208 THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 

lodging than of their journey. The next day the 
Indians entertained them at games, and the white 
men shot at a mark, using " hail," or bird-shot, 
which made the Indians wonder to see the target 
so full of holes. At about one o'clock that day, 
two fish, probably bass, shot with arrows, were 
brought in and boiled, and out of this meal forty 
men took their sustenance. 

By this time the white men had had enough of 
life in the stone age. They had not enjoyed deep 
slumbers, for the barbarous noises by which the 
Indians sang themselves to sleep, the vermin in- 
side the wigwam, and the mosquitoes outside 
allowed them very little rest. Longing for a 
quiet Sabbath at home, they set out on Friday, 
Massasoit being both grieved and ashamed that 
he could not better entertain them. Having to 
subsist on such nourishment as they could gather 
by the way, they wrote on to Plymouth, sending 
the letter by Indian messengers, asking that food 
be sent them to Amasket. Wet, weary, and foot- 
sore they reached home on Saturday. 

The next adventure was a voyage made by ten 
men of the company to find the small boy, John 
Billington, Jr., who had strayed off at the end of 
July and wandered up and down some five days, 
living on berries and what he could find. After 
much travel and trouble they found and brought 
him back. Other adventures among the Indians 
were in the form of an expedition to chastise the 



THE FIRST FAMILIES OF AMERICA 209 

enemies of Massasoit at Namaschet, where tliere 
was some fighting, though no one was killed, and 
an expedition to Boston Bay, where they made a 
treaty of peace with the natives there. These 
were of the Massachusetts tribe, who took their 
name from a " hill shaped like an arrow-head," 
probably the Blue Hills near Boston. 

Indian life then, as it had been for centuries 
previous, was one monotonous story of war, of 
human beasts seeking their prey, of fighting and 
murder, the savages finding such food as they 
could, and from time to time being swept off by 
contagious diseases. 



CHAPTER XVII 

SICKNESS AND HEALTH, WAR AND DIPLOMACY 

That first winter of the Pilgrims at Plymouth 
was the most doleful in all their history. Start- 
ing out from Leyclen with the young, strong, and 
healthy, their augmented numbers at Southamp- 
ton had been sifted at Plymouth, and none had 
died on the voyage except young William Button. 
Why, then, were both the colonists and the May- 
flower crew so frightfully decimated again and 
again ? 

When we consider the crowded ship's cabins, 
the hatches battened down, and the people kept 
over two months without proper ventilation or 
possible cleanliness, and the five weeks' exposure 
in midwinter on ship and shore at Cape Cod, 
there is no mystery. Many on board the ship 
were already reduced by scurvy. The food was 
bad and with little variety, and in those days the 
salt used was impure and often much more fit 
for paving material than for food. The first 
house built immediately became a hospital, "as 
full of beds as they could lie one by another," — 
the same bedding which had already been used 
in the ship. Nearly every person, at one time or 



SICKNESS, HE.LLTH, WAB, DIPLOMACY 211 

another, was ill, and one half of the company 
died of quick consumption. 

When the landspeople were through with their 
worst misery, the shipfolk inhabiting their germ- 
infested quarters were taken with the same epi- 
demic. " The disease began to fall among the 
seamen, so as almost half their number died be- 
fore they went away." One half of the whole 
human freight of the Mayflower found graves 
in earth or water before the return of the ship, 
on the 15th of April, 1621. 

On land the deaths in December numbered six, 
in January eight, in February seventeen, in March 
thirteen, and during the rest of the year, six more. 
There is significance in the ages of those who died. 
Of thirty-six out of the sixty-one adult Pilgrims, 
most were between the ages of twenty and thirty, 
when the liability to pulmonary consumption is 
greatest. Only seven out of the thirty-two youths 
and children, but eight out of the nine servants, 
died. In a word, what killed off the Pilgrims 
during the first year was the infectious disease, 
acute pulmonary tuberculosis, or " galloping con- 
sumption." From that day until this, consump- 
tion has ever been the scourge of New England, 
and the gi-eatest single cause of death among 
adults in the Eastern States. The emigrants 
who survived disease and exposure were undoubt- 
edly tough. They made splendid stock for the 
building up of families and the state. 



212 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAB, DIPLOMACY 

Governor Carver, in April, 1621, worn out 
with many labors in three countries and on the 
sea, as counselor, agent, nurse, farmer, magistrate, 
and man of God, was stricken in tlie field and 
died, after but a few hours of distress. He was 
buried with such official honors as the little band 
could render. Before summer was ended, the 
body of his devoted wife was laid by his side in 
the earth. As in the case of the other dead, the 
heroic survivors dared not mark the spots, lest 
savage enemies might count the graves. William 
Bradford was then chosen governor. With the 
exception of five years, when he refused reap- 
pointment, he served in this office until his death 
in 1657. 

Rheumatism, sciatica, and scurvy, at first, and 
later, smallpox, troubled the colonists ; but from 
one disease, common in Old and New England, 
the Pilgrim company was wholly free. This 
was the "bewitchment sickness." The medical 
books of those days show that physicians and 
common people believed that there were " pinings 
and wastings of the whole body, which many 
times so altered it as if it was not the same crea- 
ture, causing various and foolish actions, in which 
many have called their children changelings, the 
alteration in their outward form, as well as of 
the mind, has been so great." It was then part 
of popular and even learned theology, and of 
medical " science," that the devil took up his 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 213 

residence in the human body and made it his 
playground. Many remedies were enumerated 
which were supposed to be " offensive to devils," 
such as mistletoe, ivy, coral, peony, rue, loadstone, 
amber, and various jewels. One or more of these 
antidotes to witchcraft were worn about the body 
by thousands of people in Europe. Cinnabar, 
put into a goosequill, or into a hazelnut, sealed 
up with wax, was good to hang on the pit of the 
stomach. A ring made of an ass's hoof was also 
recommended. Children were to be removed 
from the company of the supposed witch, in order 
that the influences which caused this disease of 
fascination might be neutralized. 

In those daj^s, when medicine was more mixed 
up with astrology, and theology with superstition, 
than now, and when thousands of people were 
judicially put to death, often by burning, for sor- 
cery and witchcraft, it is certainly remarkable, 
though not inscrutable, that the Pilgrims had no 
epidemic of witchcraft. This was not because all 
the people of Plymouth, in the second generation, 
at least, did not believe in witches, for many of 
them shared the common notions of the times, — 
that human beings actually had direct dealings 
with the devil, — and late in their history they 
embodied this superstition in their laws. There 
were even two trials for witchcraft, within the 
Old Colony, but with this remarkable difference, 
as compared with those in Salem, — they cross- 



214 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAB, DirLOMACY 

exaiinnecl the witnesses, scanned their testimony, 
and found the charges not proved. 

In a word, the Plymouth men were Europeans 
who had been Lorn or educated and trained in 
the Dutch republic, where, during the very year 
that France, Germany, and England were putting 
to death thousands of people accused of witch- 
craft, was heard the first modern voice to rebuke 
this insanity of the human mind. After John 
Wier, of Grave, in 1563 challenged the very exist- 
ence of witches, came a long line of writers end- 
ing with Balthazar Bekker, who in his classic 
work, " The Bewitched World," gave the final 
death blow to the superstition by exposing the 
worthlessness of the theory upon which it was 
founded. Long before the Pilgrims had arrived 
in Leyden, Holland was bathed in an atmosphere 
of wholesome skepticism, and the Leyden church 
thrived in the tonic air. Bekker was a benefac- 
tor of the human race. After his book, witch- 
craft took its place with the moles and the bats. 

This remarkable state of affairs in their second 
home, when accusations of witchcraft and witch 
trials were at their height in their first home- 
land, must have powerfully impressed the Pil- 
grims dwelling in Leyden, and so the new world 
to which they came was not one bewitched. The 
Pilgrims showed themselves proof against this 
superstition. When the madness fell upon the 
Salem connnunity, smiting wise and foolish alike, 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 215 

the Plymouth people were cooler-headed, and. 
showed handsomely the results of their training 
in the land which an English Jubilee poet, in 
1897, salutes as the "First Home of Mental 
Liberty." 

The first crops did fairly well. Although the 
peas blossomed, they were parched in the sun and 
not worth gathering, but the maize proved to be 
then, as it is now, the most important American 
crop. 

Happy over their first harvest. Governor Brad- 
ford sent men to go out and shoot some wild 
fowl, that they might have, not one Tlianksgiving 
Day, but a whole week of fun, frolic, rejoicing, 
and gratitude to God. These hunters in one day 
killed so much feathered game as would, with 
side dishes, supply the company of about fifty 
survivors almost a week. This season, which 
may have been early in October, is sometimes 
called the beginning of our national American 
Thanksgiving Day, though at Plymouth, so far 
as we know, this first festival had no special re- 
ligious features, certainly not so definitely as the 
historic day of October 3, which they had for 
ten years seen celebrated in Leyden. The Pil- 
grims began every day with prayer and thanks- 
giving, and enjoyed their religion on no particu- 
lar day, but on all of them. They observed a 
perpetual joyful Sabbath. They were religious 
in everything, whether in eating, drinking, or 



216 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 

"working, in their pleasures as well as tlieir duties 
and devotions. 

What they wanted now, after harvest toil, was 
mirth and frolic, recreation and feasting ; and so, 
inviting the Indians to come and enjoy the glad- 
some season, they " exercised their arms " — no 
doubt shooting at a mark, bows and arrows con- 
tending with muskets and ball at the ranges. In 
other words, they enjoyed one of the Doelen or 
target festivals, such as they had so often seen in 
Holland as well as in England. We can easily 
picture these men in corselets and bandoleers, top 
hats and knee breeches, firing their heavy guns 
from a rest, while the red archers used the most 
ancient of all long-range weapons. What a tre- 
mendous impulse has been given to civilization 
by gunpowder ! What an evolution from the 
stone chip to the finished leaden arrow — the ful- 
minate copper cartridge ! 

The Indians who came with Massasoit num- 
bered about ninety men, and these also were 
feasted and entertained during three days. The 
red men themselves provided much of the fare, 
having gone out and killed five deer,, the choice 
])ieces of which they gave to Governor Bradford, 
Captain Standish, and others. It was true states- 
manship for the Pilgrim leaders thus to win so 
soon the good will of the natives, and the fruits 
of their excellent Indian policy were already ap- 
parent, for they could " walk as peaceably and 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 217 

safely in the woods as in the highways in Eng- 
hmd." Evidently these men, long used to town 
life, had not yet become skillful enough to hunt 
deer very successfully, and so they appreciated 
all the more the friendliness of the Indians in 
bringing venison. 

By the time that the first anniversary of their 
arrival had come round, seven dwellings had been 
completed, besides four houses for the use of the 
community. Others were in preparation. The 
climate at first seemed much like that of England, 
except that the summers were hotter ; the winter 
was no colder, though they found later that the 
season of 1620-21 had been a mild one. Fish 
and fowl were in great abundance, the cod coming 
in the summer and being but " as coarse meat " 
with them. This " Cape Cod turkey," which has 
for centuries filled the stomachs and enriched the 
brains of dwellers in the Eastern States, is a fish 
that can be cooked in manifold ways, eaten salt 
or fresh, is good all the year round, and is easily 
preserved. The codfish is nature's great gift to 
Massachusetts. Bradford probably did not then 
foresee that what the wool sack was to England 
— the emblem of its wealth, and in honor made 
the chief seat in Parliament — the codfish would 
be to Massachusetts, and in gilded effigy hang in 
the chief legislative hall beneath a golden dome 
under which his own precious manuscript would 
rest in the year of grace 1897. 



218 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 

Besides the bay's being full of lobsters, a hogs- 
head of eels, dug out of their beds, could often 
be taken in a night with small labor. All winter 
there were mussels and clams at their doors, and 
the Indians also brovaght oysters. Good solid 
herbs sprang up naturally in the springtime, 
with strawberries, gooseberries, grapes, and plums 
of various hue and species. Bradford was de- 
lig^hted at the o-reat abundance of roses, which 
though single were very sweet indeed. He also 
noted other flowers, and the curious noises, par- 
ticularly those of mosquitoes, seventeen - year 
locusts, and rattlesnakes. The country wanted 
only industrious men to cultivate it ; and from 
over-crowded England such men ought to come. 
Even in winter, when no farming could be done, 
the women kept busy in household work and in 
making and mending clothing, while the men cut 
timber, made clapboards, stripped off sassafras, 
bought furs, and stored up a cargo to send to 
Europe at the first opportunity. 

When on the 19th of November, 1621, Indian 
runners from CajDC Cod informed them that a 
ship was at hand, which they thought to be 
French, it being too early to expect a friendly 
vessel, Bradford ordered the cannon to be fired 
to call home the men in the fields and assemble 
the little army of twenty men. Whereupon, 
every man and boy that could handle a gun 
stood to arms. Happily, instead of a man-of-war 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 219 

full of preying" enemies, in sailed a ship smaller 
even than the Speedwell with praying Chris- 
tians from Leyden. All on board were in good 
health, having suffered, during their long passage 
of four months, nothing more than seasickness. 
The first night after landing, a son was born 
of goodwife Ford. This ship, the Fortune, of 
fifty-five tons, or one fourth the size of an Erie 
canal-boat, brought thirty-five persons. These 
were mostly young men, more lively than fore- 
sighted, and with good appetites. Not having 
much provision left, they had to be satisfied with 
what the Pilgrims could offer them out of their 
own store. The sight of the toil-worn and partly 
ragged colonists removed any rosy illusions which 
the newcomers may have had. New England was 
not yet a land of luxury. 

The Mayflower had gone back empty, because 
the colonists had not time or opportunity to load 
a cargo. The Fortune, on the contrary, was 
laden with beaver skins antl other peltry, with 
sassafras, prepared timber, and clapboards, worth 
in all about five hundred pounds, or, appraised 
in money of our day, ten thousand dollars. John 
Alden, the cooper, would oversee the clapboards, 
and Dr. Fuller the sassafras. 

Though returning rich as a fat sheep, the For- 
tune was destined to illustrate the proverb of 
going for wool and coming home shorn. She 
sailed away on December 23 ; but belying her 



220 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 

" hail," this little craft, — no wonder the Bible re- 
visers of 1611 called a fishing-smack on the " sea " 
of Galilee a " ship," — when near the English 
coast, January 29, 1G22, was captured by a French 
man-of-war and taken to God's Island (Isle 
Dieu). The cargo was confiscated by the French 
governor, and the company of thirteen persons, 
after imprisonment and rough treatment, were 
only too glad to get away from Isle Dieu to 
" God's country," England. Their captor com- 
pelled them to sign a paper, saying that he had 
taken only two hogsheads of " fox " skins. Be- 
ing ignorant of beaver and not expert in zoology, 
the Frenchman gave the best name he could 
think of to the animal which was destined to be 
the financial salvation of the colony, and to adorn 
the flag of colonial New York, the arms of more 
than one American city and state, and the Con- 
tinental money of the Revolution. What the 
Frenchmen did with this English vessel, however, 
was nothing more than what Englishmen and 
Spaniards, Dutchmen and Danes very frequently 
did to each other. The law of the safety of the 
seas, which is now that of the civilized world, 
was in process of evolution, and Hugo de Groot's 
great book on international law was not yet writ- 
ten. 

After the Fortune's misfortune, Canonicus, 
chief of the Narragansetts, evidently felt inclined 
to move out on the warpath. He sent a messen- 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 221 

ger to Plymouth with a bundle of n^w arrows 
wrapped m rattlesnake skin. 

When Squanto returned and saw the Indian 
substitute for a letter and heard how the messen- 
ger had acted, he translated the emblem as mean- 
ing a challenge. It was the Indian's way of 
flinging down the gauntlet. The serpent skin 
and the arrows were as real a symbol of war as 
the caduceus of Mercury is of commerce, or the 
dove and olive leaf are of peace. After some 
deliberation, Governor Bradford stuffed the skin 
full of powder and shot and returned the docu- 
ment. At this answer of defiance to the savages, 
their " king " was terrified, and would not touch 
it or have it stay in his house or country. In- 
deed, all the Indians were far more afraid of the 
dead skin than if it had life within it, with sound- 
ing rattles at one end and lidless eyes and poison 
fangs at the other. They posted it from place to 
place, and at length the skin, with its novel stuff- 
ing, came back whole to Plymouth. 

These Plymouth men were neither bullies nor 
cowards. They offered prayer and employed the 
wisest and best means, that their prayers might 
be answered. So ever looking to the Great 
Friend of Man, even while using their reason 
and having as yet no other defenses than their 
arms, they began to build palisades around the 
little town. They hewed down young trees, and, 
cutting off the branches, set their ends well in 



222 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAE, DIPLOMACY 

the ground and braced them at the top. By hard 
work throughout the month o£ February and a 
few days in March, they were able to have a wall 
for their dwellings. The little town nestled at 
the foot of what is now Burial Hill, and the pali- 
sades ran up the slope from the town to the fort. 
There were also four bastions, in three of which 
were gateways. Miles Standish commanded the 
military band, which was also organized and 
trained to act as a fire company. 

During the two years, 1621 and 1622, these 
Plymouth people lived in a state of semi-famine. 
During four months of the latter year, having no 
bread, they were forced to live out of the sea 
on clams and fish, with an occasional bit of game 
from the woods and groundnuts. They had even 
to feed new immigrants who came without provi- 
sions, such as the six or seven who arrived on the 
fishing-fleet, in May, 1622, by way of Maine, and 
also the Weymouth party of fifty or sixty sent by 
Weston in the ships Charity and Swan. During 
this winter they tried once more, but in vain, to 
double Cape Cod and get by sea southward ; and 
Squanto, who had encouraged them to do so, died. 
They made a trip to Boston Bay, finding trade 
very poor. At Nauset they secured, but only 
after great toil, eight or ten hogsheads of corn 
and beans. 

Occasionally a little cheer lightened their dark 
days. When an Indian stole some beads and 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAB, DIPLOMACY 223 

scissors from the shallop while lying in a creek, 
Standish went to Aspinef, the sachem, and de- 
manded the return of the goods or the culprit. 
The doughty captain took leave, refusing gifts or 
kindness. The next morning Aspinet came to 
make up, and in such a comical way that the white 
men could haidly keep from laughter. The In- 
dian chief thrust out his tongue, so that one could 
see its very root, and licked the captain's hand 
from the wrist to the finger's end, — evidently an 
imitation of a dog's way of making an apology. 
Then, following a fashion imitated from the Eng- 
lish, having been taught by Squanto, he got down 
on his marrow bones, but in so rude and savage a 
manner as to bring a smile to the white men's 
faces. After that he handed back the beads 
to Captain Standish, assuring him that he had 
floofffed the thief and had made the women bake 
bread for the white men. It was all as amusing; 
as if in a comic opera. 

The wolf being still at the door and starvation 
more than a possibility, Bradford went to the two 
other places, Middleboro and Sandwich, to buy 
corn. The " noble " red man, in a state of na- 
ture, makes his wife a beast of burden. In a state 
of grace he at least helps her. From the former 
place, the grain was transported upon the backs 
of the squaws, who were taken ill on the road, 
so that the Plymouth men had to go after the 
food and bring it home. At another time, being 



224 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAR, DIPLOMACY 

still uncertain whether they would not yet die of 
starvation, Captain Standish, in the bitter winter 
weather, went with the shallop to Bai^nstable Har- 
bor for more food, and got it through vigilance 
rather than violence. Being obliged to lodge in 
the wigwam on account of the great cold, " God 
possessed the heart of the captain with just jeal- 
ousy," and while some of his company slej)t, 
others kept awake. When the Indians stole the 
beads Standish called up all his men and de- 
manded satisfaction of the sachem. This so 
daunted the courage of the savages that they not 
only returned the beads, but brought out plenty 
of coi^n for trade and attempted no further in- 
jury- 
Hearing that Massasoit was very ill and likely 

to die, and that a Dutch shij^ had grounded on 
the beach near the chief's wigwam at Pokonokat, 
Bradford sent Winslow, who knew Dutch well, 
with John Hamden and the Indian Hobomok. 
Winslow was not only a good diplomatist, but 
had some skill in healing and nursing. He found 
that the ship had sailed away, but under his care 
Massasoit recovered. 

Massasoit, in gratitude, had revealed to Wins- 
low a plot of the Massachusetts Indians to kill 
all the Plymouth people. In a council of war, 
Standish and a picked band of eight men were 
authorized to 2,'o forth and bring back the head 
of Wituwamut, the ringleader, who was a bold 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAE, DIPLOMACY 225 

and bloody villain. Arriving in the Indian coun- 
try, this committee of justice were not able to get 
many of the red men together ; but Standish and 
four comrades, finding themselves in a wigwam 
with Pecksuwot, Wituwamut, and another young 
brave, the captain gave the signal and a fearful 
struggle began. The three Indians were killed, 
another, a youth, was hanged, and in all seven 
red men were slain and the plot came to naught. 

The medicine administered by Standish was 
drastic but salutary. The other savages were 
struck with terror. " They forsook their houses, 
running to and fro like men distracted, living in 
swamps and other places, and so brought manifold 
diseases amongst themselves whereof many are 
dead." The head of Wituwamut was stuck upon 
one of the palisades of the fort. It was then a 
general European custom to expose the heads of 
criminals, just as it was in Japan in 1870, as I 
have often seen. Much later in the colony's his- 
tory, the head of " King Philip " was exposed 
upon the fort in a similar manner for over twenty 
years. Something as wonderful as the swarm of 
honey -making bees in the skeleton of the lion 
slain by Samson entered. A pair of wrens made 
their nest in the skull. 

The summer of 1G23 was a very discouraging 
one, for although the colonists worked hard in 
preparing the soil and sowing the seed, there was 
a great drought, during six weeks of which there 



226 SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAB, DIPLOMACY 

was hardly any rain ; but showers at last fell and 
saved their crops. In the spring also, a Scots- 
man named David Thompson, who had begun a 
plantation at Portsmouth, New Hamjishire, sold 
some food to Captain Standish and returned with 
him to visit Plymouth. 

At about the beginning of August two vessels, 
the ship Ann, of one hundred and forty tons, and 
the Little James, a pinnace of forty-four tons, 
came with provisions, bringing about one hundred 
new colonists, who found no one sick at Pljanouth 
and none dead since the woeful winter of 1621. 
Many of the newcomers were old friends from 
Leyden, including near and dear relatives, and 
some had been passengers on the Paragon who 
had failed to get over on this unfortunate shijD. 
A few others, however, who had been picked up 
hj the Adventurers, were so j^lainly unfit for colo- 
nial life that Governor Bradford shipped them 
back to Europe at the expense of the Plymouth 
community. Thus was begun the American sys- 
tem of protection against pauperism, of which 
Castle Garden is in our day the exponent. The 
Pilgrim fleet had thus far brought about two hun- 
dred and thirty-three colonists. 

The ship Little James, which had been built 
for the Adventurers, was fitted for trade and dis- 
covery to the southward, but proved an expensive 
and troublesome charge. The Ann set sail on the 
20th of Sej^tember, loaded with clapboards and 



SICKNESS, HEALTH, WAB, DIPLOMACY 227 

peltry for England, where the demand for kegs 
for beer and fur for coats was gi-eat. 

Edward Winslow returned to England in the 
Ann, and when at home wrote a book, which was 
printed in 1624, entitled " Good News from New 
England." He showed " three things that over- 
throw and bane plantations," and he described 
the religion of the natives, who groped after God 
if haply they might find him. It is interesting 
to compare, as landmarks of Christianity, Wins- 
low's narrative and Whittier's " The Grave by the 
Lakeside." Thus, already, the Pilgrims were " in 
print " and well known to many interested per- 
sons. Winslow's book shows that in the building 
of their commonwealth they set the greatest store 
on character. Between their story and their 
glory, however, there .is a difference. The first 
never lacked publicity from this year 1624. The 
latter has come more slowly. 

While in England, though not until 1651, in 
his fifty-seventh year, Winslow had his portrait 
painted, and this, with Cuyp's picture of the 
Delfshaven exodus, makes two contemporary me- 
morials in art. If the reputed portrait of John 
Carver be genuine, we have three. 



CHAPTER XVIII 

POLITICS : DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

The planting season of 1623 called for a new 
departure. Until tliis time the system had of 
necessity been cooperative, almost to communism, 
for the Pilgrims worked as a company rather than 
as individuals. This led to dissatisfaction, and 
ended in failure. In 1623 the land was divided 
and assigned, so that each person should have one 
acre, the division being according to lot. 

At once there was a marked difference for the 
better. More land was planted, and all worked 
with new vigor, even the women and children 
going out gladly to help in the fields. Diplomacy 
was needed in dealing with the new people who 
had acome over on the Little James, and who 
wanted to set up a separate colony. Conference 
and concession were necessary before there was 
perfect harmony between these new " Particulars " 
and the old " Generals." Early in 1624, of the 
two hundred and thirty-three persons who had 
arrived on the four ships, one hundred and eighty 
were living. 

What kind of a government could these Plym- 
outh men, ignored by their sovereign and living 



POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 229 

in a wilderness, form? Under what social and 
political methods could they live? In natural 
history a cultivated plant or animal which has 
been long accustomed to a special environment 
maintained under certain conditions, artificial or 
natural, usually "reverts " to a simpler type when 
the environment is changed or the previous con- 
ditions are removed. Whether strawberry or 
pigeon or man, this is the law. So these English 
people adopted the forms of life under which their 
ancestors had lived a thousand years previously. 
In Friesland and adjoining islands, these old Teu- 
tonic forms were still a living reality when the 
Plymouth men began their community at the edge 
of the American wilderness. The Pilgrims pro- 
ceeded exactly as the Swiss democracies still do, 
and as I have seen them do, in their town meet- 
ings. Nearly everything was decided in general 
meeting of the whole colony. Outwardly, also, 
in the arrangement and ajDportionment of hogs 
and cattle, in their daily call by sound of the 
horn to common pasture, and in their going and 
coming at morning and evening, there was a 
marked resemblance to an ancient Teutonic vil- 
lage. 

Nevertheless, in every form and under all forms 
of government, as I have noted, — in the despotism 
of Old Japan, or the freedom of the American 
commonwealth, in the ultra-democracy of a Con- 
gregational church or of a New England village, — 



230 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

the zealous and willing men of supei-ior intelli- 
gence, experience, character, and power influence 
and lead the others. There may be dummies on 
the thrones of despotism, and there may be popes 
and shahs in a democracy. 

At first everything at Plymouth was decided 
after council, and then carried out by the gov- 
ernor. It was " Raad voor daad," as the Dutch 
say — Council before action ; but late in 1623 
the colonial records begin, and these show a gov- 
ernment gradually but increasingly representative 
and delegated. Trial was by jury, and in an elec- 
tion all the males of the colony were entitled to 
take part if of full age. Though Bradford heart- 
ily believed in rotation in office, he was elected 
and reelected many times. Edward Winslow 
served three years, Thomas Prence two years, 
Josiah Winslow one year, and Thomas Hinckley 
five years in the chief magistracy of Plymouth, 
before the tyranny of Andros trampled on law 
and local government. The colonists created a 
council of five to consult with the governor, who 
had a double vote at all the meetings. 

Besides the menace of extinction through starva- 
tion, disease, or the savages, and the risks from 
bad characters sent from Europe, there was con- 
stant danger from the Puritan party, the bishops, 
and the king, lest they should be robbed of their 
religious freedom, and their democracy be de- 
stroyed. Such a thing as self-government was 



POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 231 

hateful to more than one party in the England of 
that day. 

In 1623 Robert Gorges sent out another com- 
pany of settlers to Weymouth, and among them 
was an Episeoj)al clergyman, the Rev. William 
Morrell, to whom was granted power to regulate 
and control religious affairs in all the region 
about. This gave Bradford new trouble, though 
in a letter which was brought by the ship Char- 
ity, he had been warned by Robinson of what was 
likely to happen. But when Morrell came into 
the new land of America, he found himself one of 
the pioneers of that long and interesting list of 
failures who have tried to make a political church 
and other old world notions work in the new 
world, and who discover that what is appropriate, 
historical, and beautiful in Europe may be ugly, 
unsuitable, and worthless in the new world. Mor- 
rell, however, was a man of character and good 
sense. He became a student and an observer, 
but attempted no exercise of any authority. Even 
the " Particulars " could not make a tool of him. 

Somewhat like " Churchmen " of England who 
became " Dissenters " in Scotland, the Pilgrims, 
who had themselves been Separatists, were now of 
the " established " religion, and found a body 
of nonconformists among themselves. Their wis- 
dom was taxed to the uttermost in dealing with 
the new problem, for the " Particulars " among 
them sent back complaining letters to the Mer- 



232 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOIiEIGN 

chant Adventurers in London, giving rather a 
dark j)icture, as it seemed to them, of the state 
of religious affairs in the colony. 

When the Charity returned in 1G24 with cows 
and provisions, she brought, besides a catechism 
from the Adventurers requiring answers, Master 
John Lyford, his wife, and four children. This 
gentleman, a Puritan preacher in the state church, 
had been sent in defiance of the protest of Wins- 
low and Cushman, who were at the meeting which 
voted the mission, and through whom it was set- 
tled that Lyford should have no official power, 
except as the church at Plymouth should grant it. 
At first Lyford was all obsequiousness ; but soon 
the heads of himself, of Oldham, and of others 
among the " Particulars " were so frequently to- 
gether, that Bradford's suspicions were aroused, 
and he took a bold step, which, in the weak state 
of the colony, was like that of a cony fighting a 
hedgehog. He intercepted the letters wdiicli had 
been put on board the ship to be sent to England. 
After Oldham, the organizer of the elements of 
disturbance, had quarreled with Standish, refus- 
ing to do sentinel duty, calling the captain names, 
and even drawing a knife, for which he was put 
into the guard-house, Bradford confronted the 
plotters in a general town meeting with the inter- 
cepted letters. These had recommended that 
John Robinson be kept out of the colony, that 
Miles Standish should be deposed, and another 



POLITICS. DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 233 

captain appointed, while very serious charges were 
made against the colony in general. The court 
voted that the ringleaders should be expelled from 
the settlement, but that Lyford might remain six 
months longer. The parson, thus put on proba- 
tion, lived at Plymouth during the winter of 1624. 
He then joined Oldham at Nantasket. When, in 
1625, Oldham visited Plymouth, only to revile 
the colonists as rebels and traitors, he was put 
into jail. After this, he was led out between two 
lines of armed men, each of whom gave him a 
mild rap as he moved along, and he was thus 
ignominiously expelled from the colony. Possibly 
the Indians taught the whites this military pun- 
ishment of running the "gauntlet," though it 
may have been introduced by Standish from the 
Dutch army. 

Bradford justified his action by showing that 
to receive a man empowered to woi-k mischief by 
the politico-religious machine, at the head of 
which was Archbishop Laud and King James, 
would be like the cony which on a stormy day 
allowed the hedgehog to share its quarters. This, 
in the end, meant that the creature with the 
prickly spines had the whole of the borough to 
itself. 

The Merchant Adventurers in London were 
very angry with this act of the colony, and when 
Winslow came over early in 1625, the company 
charged the colony with being "Brownists." 



234 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

They demanded, as the conditions of further co- 
operation, that the Pilgrims should adopt the 
French or Presbyterian discipline, both in sub- 
stance and detail ; and that their old pastor and 
leader, John Robinson, should not be allowed to 
join them, unless they should first reconcile them- 
selves by written recantation with '' our church," 
— by which they meant, not only the venerable 
and beautiful Episcopal form of Christianity, but 
the political machine associated with it, at the 
head of which were James Stuart and William 
Laud. 

The brave answer of this little company of 
Christians on a strange continent and between the 
wilderness and the sea, showed their true temper 
and knowledge of the Scriptures. It proved also 
that John Robinson's teaching had not been for- 
gotten. It served to authenticate his parting 
words. The Pilgrims declared that their disci- 
pline was in hamnony with that of the Reformed 
churches. They instanced the example of Paul, 
who would have no man follow him except as he 
followed Christ. Neither would they allow that 
any man" or any church corporation had " so 
sounded the Word of God in all its depths, as to 
be able to set down precisely the church or disci- 
pline without error in substance or circumstance." 

By their bold answer the Pilgrims won and 
held their freedom. The faction among the 
Adventurers who were hostile to freedom of con- 



POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 235 

science, even in America, dropped out of view. 
The other party favorable to the Plymouth men 
wrote encouragingly, and, stating that fourteen 
hundred pounds were due, asked that the debt 
should be met as soon as agreeable. The Plym- 
outh leaders joyfully hailed this as their oppor- 
tunity. In the summer of 1625 Miles Standish 
went across the ocean to buy out the Adventurers, 
so that the colonists could be free in possession of 
their goods and lands as well as in their con- 
science. Though times were hard, money very 
difficult to borrow, and the plague was raging in 
London, Standish had some success. He returned 
after five months, bringing news and letters from 
their two former homes. King James, Maurice 
the stadholder, and John Robinson were dead. 

Despite the partial failure of Standish's mis- 
sion, the prospects of the colonists improved from 
this time forth. Evidently more care and pains 
were taken in the conduct of trade. Material for 
traffic with the Indians fortunately came to their 
hands, when the English trading- post at Monhe- 
gan was about to break up. Bradford and Wins- 
low went thither in an open boat. With David 
Thompson, of Piscataqua, they joined forces, and 
bought the whole stock for about eight hundred 
pounds. This they divided equally, getting some 
goats among the property. From their first arri- 
val they had dogs, swine, and poultry, but no 
cattle until the Charity came, in 1624, with a bull 



236 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

and three heifers. A French ship loaded with 
ruo's and other material was wrecked at Sag-ada- 
hoc. This equipped them finely with more mate- 
rial. The next question was how to build a 
larger boat, that they might extend their trade. 
They cut the shallop in half, added six feet in the 
middle, and put on a deck. 

With their renovated craft, they were able to 
go up the Kennebec River so far as where Au- 
gusta, the capital of Maine, now stands, and 
there work up a fine trade. They also sent AUer- 
ton, who was the most skillful trader among them, 
to London to conclude the bargain begun by 
Standish. Allerton was able to borrow two hun- 
dred pounds at thirty per cent., and this he in- 
vested carefully in goods for the comfort of the 
plantation. He had also contracted with the 
Adventurers, buying off their entire interest at 
eighteen hundred pounds, to be paid in install- 
ments of two hundred jiounds yearly, in London. 
The responsibility for this radical stroke of busi- 
ness was assumed by the " firm " of " vmder- 
takers," Bradford, Standish, Allerton, Winslow, 
Howland, Alden, and Prence, who, thus, by being 
bondsmen, became virtually the owners of the 
plantation. Allerton returned on a fishing- vessel 
to Maine, and thence got to Plymouth. 

Having taken so great a responsibility in one 
line of policy by making themselves vouchers for 
the colony, the " firm " became " undertakers " in 



POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 237 

another direction, — toward the colonists them- 
selves. They agreed to import every year fifty 
pounds' worth of shoes and stockings, monopoliz- 
ing also the trade outside the colony, and using 
as they pleased the boats, equipments, and trad- 
ing material. On the other hand, the colonists 
were to buy of the " undertakers " their hosiery 
and footgear, paying therefor thi-ee bushels of corn 
or six pounds of tobacco, and at the end of the 
six years the whole of the trade was to return to 
the use and benefit of the colony as before. The 
purchasers numbered about one hundred and fifty- 
six in all, of whom ninety -one were males, or 
fifty-seven men and thirty-four boys, and sixty- 
five females, of whom twenty-nine were matrons 
and thirty-six were girls. There were also twenty 
or thirty servants or apprentices. 

The eight men, who were " undertakers," or 
securities, now reorganized the little community, 
dividing the land into shares of twenty acres each, 
giving to each settler, described and enrolled as 
a purchaser, one share in addition to the land 
he already possessed. The heads of households 
were, of course, each to have as many shares as 
there were persons in their families. This new 
plan put the " Particulars " on the same level 
with the " Generals." The meadow-land, how- 
ever, was held as common. 

In other words, here was the village community 
system, in which the rights of the individual were 



238 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

recognized along with the common ownership of 
land. This had been the original mode of life 
in Friesland and in New Netherland, as well as 
in Anglo-Saxon England and at Plymouth. It 
seems to be a natural order. 

No cattle, as has been said, were in the settle- 
ment until 1624, though there were dogs, swine, 
and poultry. In 1625 there were nine and in 
1627 twelve cows. These were then so appor- 
tioned that there was one cow to thirteen persons, 
the cattle, like the land, being assigned by lot to 
each of the divisions. The cows were probably 
of both English and Dutch stock. One was 
blind, another was noted for smooth horns, and 
one or two were red. The more numerous refer- 
ences to black and white, however, show that 
most of the herd were of the Holstein-Friesland 
breed so famous and frequent in Holland. The 
descriptions of their colors and horns show that 
they were well known by sight but not by names, 
for the Pilgrims were such stalwart realists that 
they had apparently little sentiment in the giving 
of names, except to their children. 

This year, 1627, begins the Pilgrims' book of 
Numbers. After their Genesis, or beginning, in 
England, their Exodus, or going out to Holland, 
their Leviticus in Leyden, where their polity and 
worship were shaped, came the fourth phase of 
their development. Henceforth we have in their 
books of records the story of their methodical 



POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 239 

arrangements, lists of names, inventories, statis- 
tics, and treasury accounts, which remind us of 
the fourth book of the Pentateuch, and recall the 
older Pilgrim's Progress, which was led by Moses 
and written by him or his successors. Counting 
those who had come to stay, or had been born in 
New Plymouth, the total number was two hundred 
and sixty-seven. Fifty-eight had died, and fifty- 
three had removed. After the first awful winter, 
the colonists were so healthy that but six persons 
died during the succeeding six years. 

From this year, 1G27, their finances were estab- 
lished on a sound basis. As once they had found 
shelter from persecution and many years of life 
and comfort in Holland, so now fi'om the Dutch 
in America they were to learn the secret of wealth 
by getting from them the idea and the reality of 
Indian currency. Their old neighbor in Leyden, 
Jesse de Forest, had at last persuaded both his 
Walloon friends and the Dutch government to 
start permanent colonies of men, women, and 
children on Manhattan Island and in the Hud- 
son and Mohawk river valleys. By 1627 there 
were two hundred and seventy people in New 
Netherland, who had over one hundred cattle. 
Although the Dutch claimed the territory in 
which the Pilgrims had settled, they had too 
much to attend to at home to urge their claims ; 
but in March, 1627, Bradford was pleasantly 
surprised on receiving a friendly letter from the 



240 POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 

secretary of the West India Company's govern- 
ment at Manhattan. With true republican cour- 
tesy, that recognized untitled citizens as " noble, 
worshipful, the wise and prudent lords," — espe- 
cially if they were really so, — the Dutch authori- 
ties addressed the governor and counselors resid- 
ing in " Nieu-Pliemuen " (or New Plymouth), 
and, after wishing them temporal and eternal 
happiness, expressed a desire for kindly inter- 
course. Now that the mother countries beyond 
sea had renewed their league, they would meet 
their English friends for trade wherever desired. 
The secretary, Isaac de Rasieres, was evidently 
one, or the son of one, of those Walloons, or Bel- 
gian French, of the Reformed faith, who had, 
like the Pilgrims, come to Holland for religious 
freedom. It shows how well Dutch was under- 
stood among these late and long residents in 
Leyden, that the reply to the director and Coun- 
cil of New Netherland, " our very loving friends 
and Christian neighbors," was in Dutch. It has 
in it none of that abominable prejudice which 
disgraces English speech and people, and which 
Americans have inherited from the old-world 
naval wars of later times, while it reveals the 
gratitude, the honesty, and the noble character of 
the Pilgrims. The Pilgrims were English to the 
core, yet they were not ashamed, but very glad, 
to recognize their obligations. Recipi'ocating the 
Dutch friendship, this occasion was taken for 




^ J -,& ^ • . ■, ""^ 



2 % 



J „- 



•^ 



\ 




POLITICS: DOMESTIC AND FOREIGN 241 

expressing grateful remembrance of the way the 
Pilgrims had been treated in Holland. 

One passage from a letter is as follows : " Ac- 
knowledging ourselves tied in a strict obligation 
into your country and state, for the good enter- 
tainment and free liberty we had, and our breth- 
ren and countrymen yet there have, and do enjoy 
under your most honorable Lords and States 
. . . for which we are bound to be thankful and 
our children after us." 

With a characteristic English thriftiness and 
love of honorable gain, and with an eye to the 
main chance quite equal to the Dutch, and wish- 
ing, withal, to keep out of difficulties, Bradford 
cautioned his neighbors against settling within 
the territory claimed by England. He requested 
them not to trade in the field already occupied 
by the Plymouth men, around Buzzard's Bay or 
the Narragansett and Sowaras region. 

Meanwhile in Leyden, on March 4, 1625, John 
Robinson had died. There are two Dutch records 
of the burial. The city census of October, 1622, 
enrolled him and his wife Bridget ; his children, 
John, Bridget, Isaac, Mercy, Fear, and James ; 
and their servant maid, Mary Hardy. Isaac Rob- 
inson, the ancestor of a host of good people, came 
to America in 1631. The congregation in Leyden 
flourished until 1658, when, being more Dutch 
than English, it united with the Reformed 
Church. 



CHAPTER XIX 

A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 

In the following August, 1627, the government 
at Manhattan sent a firm and respectful answer 
to Plymouth Colony, intimating that the territory 
between the fortieth and forty-fifth parallels of 
north latitude was claimed by the Dutch Con- 
gress, or States-General, as well as by the Eng- 
lish king ; that its right to trade was as good 
as that of the Pilgrims, and that this claim 
would be maintained. The bearer of this letter 
was John Jacobson, who was from Wieringen, 
an island in the Zuyder Zee near the Helder. 
This Hollander was pleasantly entertained at 
Plymouth, and took back a letter from Bradford, 
kind, but firm, asserting that any intruders on 
their domain of trade would be expelled by force. 
He requested that a Dutch officer from Manhat- 
tan should visit them and make a mutual agree- 
ment, but gave warning of the danger incurred 
because of the unscrupulous pirates and kidnap- 
ers infesting the coast. Should they fall into the 
hands of the privateersmen, or those of Virginia, 
or the fishing-ships which came to Maine from 
England, they would suffer. 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 243 

The Dutch responded promptly and sent their 
secretary, Isaac de Rasieres, who on the 4th o£ 
October, in the bark Nassau, came to Buzzard's 
Bay, at Manomet, or Sandwich, where the Plym- 
outh men had a trading-house. John Jacobson, 
being a good pedestrian, tramped in six hours 
the twenty miles from Manomet to Plymouth, 
but de Rasieres, being a corpulent gentleman, 
was not able to walk so far. He feared that 
his feet would fail him, and asked that a boat 
be sent. His request was granted, and this first 
foreign embassy, consisting of the secretary from 
New Amsterdam, with his trumpeters and some 
other attendants, came by water. De Rasieres 
had cloth of three sorts and colors, a chest of 
white sugar, and some small wares, for which 
the Plymouth people paid him in home-grown 
tobacco. Thus began a trade which for many 
years was one of mutual benefit. It lasted until 
the Virginians, coming up by sea, diverted it. 

Most important of all the results of this meet- 
ing of the American Dutch and the American 
English was that Plymouth learned the use of 
wampum. The Iroquois, or the confederated 
Five Nations in New Netherland, were far higher 
in the scale of civilization than any other Indians 
north of Mexico. They were traders, as well as 
fighters, having even a fixed currency. On com- 
ing to America the Dutch, with their keen com- 
mercial sense, perceived at once the tremendous 



244 A VISIT FEOM MANHATT.iN 

importance of this shell money for both traffic 
and diplomacy. They saw that seawant, or wam- 
pum, was more than coinage to the men of the 
forest. Beside being used like pieces and sums 
of money which circulated among many tribes, 
even far in the interior, they noted that when 
strung and wrought into patterns, it was in 
America what letters, sealed documents, precious 
vouchers and memorials, and even crown jewels 
were in Europe. To this day, the ancient tradi- 
tions and the history of those tribes which still 
keep their organization are expressed in belts of 
wampiim. Long Island had been named Sea- 
wanaka, the island of shells, from its abundance 
of seawant, or wampum material. 

With their superior tools, drills, hammers, 
knives, and lathes, the men from the land of banks 
and of the diamond-polishing industry were able 
quickly to get and to keep the manufacture of wam- 
pum almost entirely in their own hands. Some of 
the Dutch settlements, notably Schenectady, be- 
came veritable mints for the making of this kind of 
money. Here the intelligent and nimble squaws 
were employed in considerable numbers to string 
and arrange the perforated beads, which were 
drilled, ground, and polished by the white men. 
The wampum made by the Dutch, or by squaws 
under Dutch oversight, was not only far better, 
but much more beautiful, than that from the red 
men's fingers alone. To-day some of the noblest 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 245 

and most striking documents and autographs in 
American history are of wampum, the archives 
of the Iroquois being especially interesting. 
Among other shell muniments is the treaty 
document of Penn, " never sworn to and never 
broken." 

It was de Rasieres who acquainted Bradford 
with this money. He thus gave the Pilgrims 
their first idea of aboriginal currency, and sold 
them fifty pounds' worth. Among the Algonquin 
Indians wampum was then not much known, if at 
all, east of Narragansett Bay. At first the Pil- 
grims may have thought that the Dutch had over- 
reached them, for it was nearly two years before 
their red neighbors took up even the fifty pounds' 
worth of shell money ; but after that time, the 
eastern Indians having learned its benefits, the 
Plymouth men could hardly supply it fast enough. 
Meanwhile these Indians had learned how to drill 
and string similar tokens, which they made from 
the quahog or big clam shells. Six white beads 
or three purple ones made from the eye of the 
clam were worth a penny, or a dime in the values 
of to-day. The Englishmen were not at first so 
skillful as the Dutch in making the Indian money, 
and they could not produce it so cheaply as the 
Indians made it. Not only was trade stimulated 
through this business and the Pilgrims enriched, 
but the Indians also were made wealthier, and now 
began to buy firearms, which not only the Dutch 



246 A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 

and French and English fishermen, but probably 
all of the whites in New England who came to 
the coast, except the Plymouth men, sold them. 
In time the red men with their new weapons took 
courage to begin " Kmg Philip's war." 

No extant description of the town of Plymouth, 
even from the pen of Bradford or Winslow, is so 
complete and interesting as that of de Rasieres, 
whose letter to his friend Herr Blommaert, a di- 
rector of the Dutch West India Company, is in 
the Royal Library at the Hague. He pictures 
the town and the ceremonious way of attending 
divine worship on Sunday. When the drum beat, 
the men assembled in front of Captain Standish's 
door, each with his musket or firelock, and in cold 
weather having on their cloaks. Forming ranks 
three abreast, the sergeant led them without beat 
of the drum to the church. Behind the guard 
walked the governor, who had on his right hand 
the preacher, and on the left hand the captain, 
who carried a little stick in his hand. They 
marched in good order, and in the meeting-house 
each one set his gun near him. Thus they were 
vigilant day and night. " Their government is 
after the English form," the election being held 
annuall}^ ; but in inheritance the Pilgrims had 
discarded English primogeniture and followed 
the Dutch method of placing the children all in 
one degree, making only a nominal acknowledg- 
ment to the oldest son, on account of the seniority 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 247 

of birth. De Rasieres praised warmly the high 
morality of the Pilgrims, showing how they influ- 
enced also the Indians to nobler living. He even 
criticises severely the Dutch in the Hudson River 
region. 

In appraising the exact value of de Rasieres's 
letter we nmst not lose sight of the subjective 
element, or of local politics and of commercial or 
ecclesiastical jealousies, with which the Dutch, 
like the English, were afflicted. De Rasieres, 
who wrote when his fellow-countrymen in New 
Netherland were without a church or a minister, 
and in the year before the Rev. J. Michaelius 
came to organize a church in New Amsterdam, 
had already lost his position through some fac- 
tion. Then, his one great idea was to show in 
the darkest colors possible how bad was the gov- 
ernment at Manhattan, how low the morals of 
those who had displaced him, and how wicked the 
people were. As a matter of course, he takes 
without criticism what his friends at New Plym- 
outh tell him, and uses the information in order 
to rub brine into the wounds of those whom he 
would injure. 

Financial freedom for Plymouth Colony was 
gradually and slowly won as wampum was more 
and more used, and as the beaver skins sent over 
to England brought good prices. 

Although the Plymouth men never possessed a 
royal charter, yet in 1629 the Council of New 



248 A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 

England, the Earl of Warwick being president, 
granted to the colony a new patent, dated Janu- 
ary 23, 1630, which for the first time defined 
the limits of territory, including a grant of land 
for fifteen miles on each side of the Kennebec 
River. This charter, with the compact framed 
at Cape Cod in 1620, formed the basis of govern- 
ment. The colony was to follow the laws of Eng- 
land " as near as may be." 

The Plymouth men having built a fortified 
trading-house on the present site of Augusta, 
Maine, and stocked it wdth dry goods and cloth- 
ing, rugs and blankets, corn and biscuit and 
dried fruit, knives, hatchets, and wampum, were 
getting much beaver in return and making money. 
Their financial jirosperity, however, came near 
having a dangerous setback because the over- 
adventurous Allerton exceeded his authority, mis- 
managing the funds and getting the colonists 
in debt to the amount of nearly five thousand 
pounds, while they were owing one thousand 
pounds. Nevertheless, their excellent trade, good 
crops and fisheries, and the application of experi- 
ence to business enabled them to pay off all their 
debts in 1633, so that at the end of that year they 
owed no man anything but love. 

The red Indians were not the only immediate 
enemies who threatened to break up the settle- 
ment at Plymouth. There were dangerous char- 
acters amono- the miscellaneous white men that 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 249 

now began to get a foothold along the seashore. 
One of these was the infamous Thomas Morton, 
of Merrymount. This renegade lawyer from Lon- 
don, after inciting a rebellion among the inden- 
tured servants at Quinoy, in the absence of his 
partner, or employer, Wollaston, opened a lively 
trade with the red men, and with his companions 
spent his spare time in drunkenness and worse 
wickedness. They brought in Indian squaws, 
laid in a supply of rum, and erected a Maypole 
decorated with rhymes of Morton's own writing. 
Then the squaws and whites joined in the revels 
with dances, Morton being the chief. The whites 
sold arms to the Indians, employing them to hunt 
for them and get furs. 

Still further and worse, these communists wel- 
comed to their company whatever white men 
would join them. This made the situation dan- 
gerous, not only to Plymouth, but to the other 
colonies, some ten in number, that were scattered 
about in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. 
With stalwart hunters suddenly changed from 
the stone age, so far as opportunity to do mis- 
chief was concerned, and becoming expert marks- 
men with firearms, and Merrymount liable to be 
an Adullam's cave, where unruly servants and 
lawless characters could find refuge, there were 
dangers worse than those of an Indian plot. For 
the safety of all the colonists, King James had, 
in 1622, forbidden the sale of guns to the Indians. 



250 A VISIT FEOM MANHATTAN 

Kespectfiil letters were sent to Morton calling his 
attention to this fact, and urging him to be loyal 
and obedient. His reply was one of defiance. 

Thereupon Governor Bradford was implored 
to enforce the laws by military aid. Standish 
liked nothing better than to attempt the enter- 
prise. Probably, since Morton had called the 
short and fiery captain " Captain Shrimp," he 
had the spur to his pride to show what a shrimp 
could do. When Morton saw the Plymouth 
armed men approaching, he got ready his ammu- 
nition and loaded his own gun until it was nearly 
half full. After setting out plenty of powder and 
bullets where they would be handy, he began to 
suspect that his barricades would not help him 
and might be set on fire. So he gallantly led out 
his followers, who, unfortunately, were full of 
liquor. He advanced on Standish, but the little 
captain pushed Morton's gun to one side and 
seized the commander of Merrymount. The only 
blood shed was from the nose of a drunken man 
of the garrison, who lost a little of his hot ichor 
by running against a sword. The historian of 
the Netherlands, John Lothrop Motley, who made 
these episodes the basis of his novel " Meriy- 
mount," writes of the victor, " Miles in name, 
leagues in valor, and but a few paltry inches in 
stature." 

Morton was taken prisoner to Plymouth, and 
then sent to England in charge of an agent ; but 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 251 

when in the old country Sir Ferdinando Gorges, 
being a favorite at court, had the good " church- 
man " saved from punishment, as having been 
persecuted by the " Brownists." Shielded by 
Laud, Morton twice visited Plymouth, and was 
expelled. In 1637 he published a scurrilous 
book full of lies and slander, under the title " The 
New English Canaan." Turning up again in 
Plymouth in 1643, Morton lived there during the 
winter, sometimes shooting birds over Captain 
Standish's land, evidently with the idea of getting 
into a quarrel, and thus bringing the Plymouth 
men into trouble with the government of London. 
Being unsuccessful, he went to Boston and then 
to Piscataqua, where he sank out of sight and 
died. 

By this time Plymouth plantation had spread 
beyond its original bounds, for the people were 
learning the country. They began to see that 
the soil was much better in the interior. They 
had settled on the old glacier drift, but the river 
valleys and the bottom-lands were much richer. 
Going farther inland they fared better. Hence 
we find many graves, of both the old comers and 
the newer arrivals, but especially of those of the 
second and the third generations of the Pilgrims, 
in central Massachusetts or in States adjacent. 
Furthermore, as the cattle increased, their owners 
were compelled to go farther afield for a pasture. 
At first they built summer huts and encampments 



252 A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 

wherein to stay between frosts ; but later they 
erected whiter dwellings. Thus gradually vari- 
ous villages were formed. 

Miles Standish, William Brewster, and John 
Alden went to live in Duxbury, around which 
are places with old names, showing that Lon- 
doners settled the second town of the Old Colony. 
Edward Winslow obtained land at Green Harbor, 
afterwards known as Marshfield. This was the 
third of the eight separate towns which existed 
when, in 1643, following the example of the fed- 
eral Dutch republic, the New England confedera- 
tion proposed by the Plymouth men was formed. 
These towns were Plymouth, Duxbury, Marsh- 
field, Scituate, Barnstable, Taunton, Yarmouth, 
and Sandwich. 

By this time, also, despite all their difficulties, 
opposition at home and abroad, and the determi- 
nation of the faction among the Adventurers to 
keep further " Brownists " from coming to them 
from Leyden, the men and women of New Plym- 
outh — for the women, no less than the men, were 
factors in the case — had demonstrated the suc- 
cess of their plantation. 

Animated by the shining example of success 
of the Pilgrim company, there now began from 
England, thanks to the tyranny of Charles Stuart 
and the persecution of Laud, a great movement 
of emigration, lasting from 1628 to 1640, dur- 
ing which no fewer than twenty-three thousand 



A VISIT FROM MANHATTAN 253 

English, Scottish, Welsh, and Irish people came 
to America ; or more than the whole number from 
1640 to 1775. The English immigrants, though 
representing forty counties, were chiefly from that 
eastern side of England, which, having always 
been so close to the Continent, was quick to re- 
spond to reformatory and civilizing movements, 
and which was not only nearest to the Nether- 
lands, but was richer in Netherlandish blood, 
having been for a thousand years continually 
reenforced by fresh emigrations of Saxons, An- 
gles, Frisians, and Dutchmen. God makes the 
best manhood out of a composite of the best 
human stocks. 



CHAPTER XX 

LAW AND PUNISHMENT 

The Pilgrim republic was a true prototype of 
the United States of America, cosmopolitan, tol- 
erant. Christian. Here were people of at least 
seven nationalities, of varying degrees of charac- 
ter, culture, and social standing, and of different 
creeds and ideas of government in church and 
state. Yet into this colony men of all sects and 
of no sect were received if they were willing to 
obey the laws and usages. With an intense and 
positive faith, the Pilgrims made no form of words 
to bind the conscience. They welcomed to their 
church fellowshijD all who made Jesus Christ 
their teacher and model. To safeguard their own 
organism, they warned off and kept off all who 
proposed to destroy their freedom or to introduce 
anarchy or revolution. 

Yet even among themselves there were charac- 
ters " shuffled in," as Bradford says, who were 
dangerous to the peace and integrity of the settle- 
ment. Stocks had been used in most European 
and perhaps all English towns and villages prior 
to this time, but were not put up in Plymouth 
until necessity comj)elled their erection. There 



LAW AND PUNISHMENT 255 

would have been use for them so early as 1621, 
or before the Pilgrims had been on shore more 
than five months. Billington, whose sons had 
already given him and others so much trouble, on 
refusing to obey some order of Captain Standish, 
was tied neck and heels together and put in a 
public place before the whole settlement. Two 
servants who wanted to fight a duel were served 
in like manner. 

In 1630 Billington, being angry with John 
Newcomen, for interfering in some way with his 
hunting, waylaid and fired at him, mortally 
wounding him. The murderer was arrested, and 
by regular process of trial by jury condemned to 
be hanged. He pleaded for his life, questioning 
also the authority of the colony to inflict capital 
punishment, and the matter was referred to the 
Puritan Governor Winthrop and his counselors 
as a court of appeals. Their answer was that 
Billington ought to die and the land be purged 
from blood. Greatly to the grief of the Plymouth 
men, who made their feelings give way to con- 
science, they carried out the sentence. 

Goodwin, in his " Pilgrim Republic," notes the 
fact that in Plymouth town of to-day " the public 
places so rarely bear the names interwoven with 
her early history, and that the few exceptions com- 
memorate Allerton the treacherous, Shirley the 
defrauder, and Billington the malefactor." As 
a matter of fact, there is very little that shows 



256 LAW AND PUNISHMENT 

much sentiment, in the ordinaiy meaning of the 
term, among the Pilgrim company : certainly very 
little, such as later artists and poets have sug- 
gested in the transfiguring creations of their 
imagination. One does not find, except in the 
names of towns, much to suggest either their old 
Fatherland or their home during their stay in 
Holland. Those names which, like Leyden 
Street, seem to recall memories or to breathe 
gratitude are of modern suggestion and by their 
descendants. There is not yet any town in the 
United States named Scrooby, Austerfield, or 
Bawtry. Not only were the Pilgrim Separatists 
not much given to surface sentiment, and cer- 
tainly never to weak sentimentalism, but we 
must remember that for one whole generation 
after reaching America, they were looked upon 
by their Puritan neighbors as " Brownists," and 
were spoken of with contempt. Even in the sec- 
ond and third generation this offensive epithet 
was more or less in use. 

Probably the real reason for the absence of 
place names redolent of sentiment or gratitude 
was a political one. The special use of English 
or Dutch names of their old homes would have 
looked like defiance or disloyalty to King James. 
Little as we realize it now, the hostility of the 
throne and church in England, until Cromwell's 
time, was a constant menace of death to the Pil- 
grim church and republic. 



LAW AND PUNISHMENT 257 

In these pbenomena of history and phases of 
human nature there is nothing extraordinary. 
Whether it be a great man or a great idea, it 
takes humanity a long time to appreciate what is 
excellent. Whether it be Jesus of Nazareth, or 
Paul, or St. Francis of Assisi, or Oliver Crom- 
well, or Abraham Lincoln, or the Pilgrims, or 
the Methodists, or the Anabaptists, or the Mikado- 
reverencers, time is necessary for the truth to rise 
clear of the murky vapors and impure media 
through which men look. Only after ages can 
some truths be seen shining as clear as the sun 
by day and as bright as the stars by night. Yet 
" time at last sets all things even," and truth is 
safe, for " the eternal years of God are hers." 
To-day all that the Pilgrims need is to have their 
story told without embroidery, without detraction. 
The narrative itself is an epic. 

The legislation and punishments of the Old 
Colony period are to-day subjects for amusement 
as well as for reflection. These Englishmen at 
Plymouth were of the seventeenth and not of the 
nineteenth century. The old comers brought 
with them the legal ideas and the social cvistoms 
which they had seen in vogue in England and 
Holland. Vice and crime were dealt with no 
worse, and usually better than had been the case 
in the England which they had seen. The sec- 
ond genei-ation, as has been so often illustrated 
in other colonies, was of ruder manners and of a 



258 LAW AND PUNISHMENT 

lower grade of intelligence than had been the 
first immigrants. Those who had not been edu- 
cated in England and mellowed in Holland, or 
had never joined in the mirth and sports of either 
of the older countries, were harsher and less in- 
telligent, as well as more narrow and supersti- 
tious. Indeed, this seems to be the rule among 
people not born in the old seats of civilization, 
who must yet be pioneers in subduing the wilder- 
ness. Social improvement usually comes with 
later generations. There is little doubt, also, that 
by being confederate with the Puritans, from 
1643 to 1686, the Plymouth men lost in manli- 
ness and in self-reliance what they gained in po- 
litical security and mercantile success. So also 
in the making of their laws and in the cast of 
their minds, the second generation was less rea- 
sonable than the first. The theological climate 
was much more rigorous, and the intolerance of 
youth and the reversion to mere animal instincts 
were more noticeable. 

The stocks were often put to use. This means 
of punishment is especially an English institution, 
going back to the Middle Ages. It was some- 
times found even at the church porch, for correct- 
ing a variety of offenders. Beside their own 
home-grown malefactors, the Pl^'mouth men some- 
times kejDt their stocks well warmed by Friends 
to whom they were not friends. The stocks were 
a great aid to good order in the meeting-house, 



LAW AND PUNISHMENT 259 

for any one caught laughing, joking, flirting or 
asleep, especially if such practices were persisted 
in, was dragged out by the tithingman and framed 
to make a public picture. These oaken timbers 
had openings for the legs and arms. While sit- 
ting on the bench or stool, with legs held helpless 
in the notches of the beams, every small boy and 
idle person could jeer at the poor victim. 

We can imagine many a scene in Plymouth 
where with horn lantern and staff in hand the 
magistrate at night went after some victim whom 
he dragged out of bed, to put in timber locks. 
Then the next day, boys and girls, straggling 
Indians, and surprised fathers and mothers would 
go out to see the man or woman held helplessly 
in shameful plight. Sometimes a written paper, 
describing the crime of the person disgraced, was 
nailed up. 

The stocks, ducking-stools, pillory, whipping- 
post and gag were temjiorary punishments bor- 
rowed from England, but the continuous wearing 
of a shameful badge for any offense was probably 
not of English, but of continental origin. We 
all know what a romantic stoiy Nathaniel Haw- 
thorne has made of " The Scarlet Letter." This 
badge of shame was not imaginary, but real. In 
mediseval Europe it was not only the custom to 
compel the criminal to wear letters indicative of 
crime, such as / for incest, A for adultery, and 
T for thief, but even the Jews were compelled 



260 LAW AND PUNISHMENT 

to wear a certain article of dress or a mark to 
declare their generation. Lepers, other diseased 
persons, and heretics were also branded. These 
social scars were made first with the hot iron 
npon the skin, just as slaves were branded with 
owners' names. Later, as the laws were amelio- 
rated, the embroidered or painted letter was made 
a substitute for the brand in the flesh. 

The following is one of several similar entries 
in the records of the Plymouth Colony : ^ " At 
this court, Catheren Kaiues ... is sentenced by 
the court to be forthwith publicly whipped here 
at Plymouth and afterwards at Taunton on a 
public training day and to wear a Roman B cut 
out of red cloth and sewed to her open garment 
on her right arm ; and if she shall be ever found 
without it so worn while she is in the government 
to be forthwith publielj^ whipped." This was for 
blasphemy. Among letters employed in Plym- 
outh justice were B for blasphemy, D for drunk- 
enness, V iov vieiousness, and so on. 

We never hear of, nor could we imagine books 
being condemned to the fire in Plymouth, as was 
the case in Boston in 1650, with Mr. William 
Pynchon's work on " A Meritorious Price of Our 
Redemption." Indeed, this was not the only time 
that books were burned or authors whipped in 
Boston, — the city which now has Pynchon's 
name on one of its streets and is so hospitable to 
new ideas. 
1 Vol. iii. pp. Ill and 112, 1656-57, 5 March, Bradford Governor. 



LAW AND PUNISHMENT 261 

The Englislimen in America set up the whip- 
ping-post very quickly after their arrival. They 
were not particular whether the skins welted with 
the scourge were white, black, or red. The work 
of stripe-making was often done on lecture days 
and even on Sundays. This punishment was in. 
flicted for profanity, perjury, lying, selling fire- 
water to the Indians, or for even sleeping in church. 
Neither women nor men were spared. In 1638 
the court in Plymouth, found that " divers persons 
unfit for marriage, both in regard of their young 
yeai's as also in regard of their weak estate, some 
practicing the inveigling of men's daughters and 
maids and contrary to their parents' and guard- 
ians' liking, and of maid servants without the 
leave and liking of their masters," ordered pun- 
ishment either by fine or flogging. No doubt the 
behavior of the victims or the officers of law fur- 
nished a good deal of amusement, revealing also 
a lack of sensitiveness to human suffering, — just 
as in old Japan the public decapitation of crimi- 
nals always brought, and in the China to-day 
brings, a crowd of spectators from Christian na- 
tions. In Plymouth there must have been a good 
deal of public whipping, both of women and men, 
when suffering mingled with the noise of the 
mob ; but even this judicial flagellation was insig- 
nificant, compared with what was done in some 
other colonies. 

After all that can be truthfully said of Puri- 



262 LAW AND PUNISHMENT 

tan rigor or Pilgrim severity, the punishments 
were worse in the southern colonies than in the 
northern, but far below the standard of justice 
tempered with mercy which prevailed in the mid- 
dle colonies. That portion of the New Europe 
in America settled under the more enlightened 
ideas of the Netherlanders avoided the extremes 
of both Cavalier and Puritan. Being under the 
sway of milder and more Christian legislation 
and custom, the empire region of the middle 
colonies was more free from unreasonably cruel 
punishments. 

The legislation of the Plymouth Colony, while 
closely conformable to that of the rest of the 
world in Christendom, was singularly free fi-oni 
the extremes seen in the rest of New England 
and in the southern colonies. It was wonderfully 
like that of the Netherlands, where both in 
government and custom Christianity and civili- 
zation were then much better illustrated. On the 
statute books of Plymouth there were fewer capi- 
tal crimes named than in any other colonies north 
or south of New York and Pennsylvania. The 
Plymouth law decreeing the death sentence upon 
Quakers was passed late in their history and was 
never enforced. The spirit of the Pilgrims had 
been chastened by their persecutions, sufferings, 
and exile and by dwelling in a tolerant republic, 
v/hich was then the leader among nations. 



CHAPTER XXI 

FOOD, DEESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

Let us see how the Plymouth people ate their 
food, and what kind of a diet the men would be 
able to provide and the women to cook, dress, and 
serve. Within ten or twenty years after that 
first awful winter, life had settled down to steady 
routine. Living in timber houses, at first very 
rough, mud-plastered, with thatched roof and 
greased paper windows, neither furniture nor 
household adornment could have been anything 
but the simplest. As time sped on and they 
became better acquainted with the resources of 
the country, and the ships from Europe brought 
over more numerous comforts, the homes became 
brighter and cheerier, and approached more 
nearly the standard of daily life in Europe. 

The era of hot drinks imported from the far 
East, and first used in Holland, had not yet 
come. During the first years of the colony, 
tea, coffee, and Delft or Japan ware were things 
probably merely heard of, and even in the later 
years were curiosities. Not until toward the end, 
in 1691, did they become even luxuries to be en- 
joyed by a few. 



264 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

Beer was the every-day drink among the Plym- 
outh people. Those who could not afford this 
drank water. Rarely was a piece of china seen 
upon the table, though earthenware was occa- 
sionally in use. Most of the dishes, apart from 
the mugs and cups, were of wood or of pewter. 
All well-to-do housekeepers took pride in polish- 
ing their metal ware, making it shine like silver, 
and adorning their mantelpieces, shelves, and 
cupboards with the platters and dishes. 

Tobacco, the seed of which the Pilgrims ob- 
tained from the red men, was grown at Plymouth 
and formed in the first years, until the better 
Virginia article displaced it, a small crop. The 
men often refreshed themselves with its fumes, 
but usually did so indoors. In 1638 a law for- 
bade smoking in the streets. The legislation 
against drunkenness in one's house, the sale of 
spiritous liquors to Indians, or in quantities to 
cause intoxication, was stringent. The idea was 
prohibition to Indians and temperance among 
the whites. 

In our minds' pictures, we may imagine the 
people sitting down to their tables made of hewn 
wood, smoothed by the axe, and on stools or 
benches made of the same material and in the 
same fashion. Only the well-to-do folk had rush- 
bottomed chairs from the old land. Governor 
Carver's chair is preserved to this day, and is an 
exact copy of those still found in rural Holland. 




PILGRIM RELICS 



I Belonged to Elder Brewster. 2 Belonged to Governor Carver. 
3 and 4 belonged to Myles Standish. 5 Belonged to Dr. Samuel 
Fuller, the physician of the Pilgrims. 



FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 265 

Tlie Mayflower of legend — the ship which had 
no more real existence than the Flying Dutchman 
— sailed into Plymouth Harbor apparently with 
her decks loaded and all her spars hung with old 
furniture, teapots, luxurious table-ware, and mis- 
cellaneous household stuff. The historic ship 
had room for very little indeed except the pas- 
sengers and their personal apparel and equipment. 

In the American colonies, as elsewhere in 
Christendom, the Oriental hot drinks proved a 
powerful factor, not only in developing the cera- 
mic art, but in the social elevation of women. 
The mother took her place at the head of the 
table. Teapot, sugar-bowl, and cream-pitcher, or 
jug, became of more importance than the salt- 
cellar or spice-box. 

Knives were plentiful, but spoons less so, while 
forks were unknown. Large or long-handled 
prongs were used to turn the meat in the pot, but 
a table fork for each person was probably never 
seen in Plymouth Colony. The meat was held 
with the fingers and cut in pieces on the platter, 
and the bits taken to the mouth by the unassisted 
hand. Forks became fashionable first in Italy, 
and the nine hundredth anniversary of their in- 
troduction was celebrated in 1897. Among Eng- 
lish people, until late in the seventeenth century, 
they were curiosities as great as umbrellas would 
have been at that time even in London. The pre- 
historic men used a certain kind of fork, just as 



266 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

the Fiji Islanders did until their conversion to 
Christianity during this century, but most prob- 
ably only at their cannibal feasts. 

Well-to-do people, in the days when vegetables 
were very few and when all kinds of spices were 
in demand, sprinkled saffron upon their meat ; 
and in Essex, from which county many settlers of 
Massachusetts came, this plant was so much culti- 
vated that one place was called Saffron Walden. 
Its powder made an agreeable flavor, was easily 
dissolved in water, and was not injui-ious. It was 
quite common, before forks came into use, to see 
the left-hand fingers of ladies yellow with the 
stain. The word "saffron " was often used as a 
verb, even as we see in Chaucer. 

As napkins and hand-wipers were quite neces- 
sary on the Pilgrims' tables, so we find them to 
have been very common. 

Vegetables were comparatively few. The white 
potato was unknown, and the sweet potato was 
not common until the next century. The food 
for the children would be milk and corn-meal 
pudding, or, to use a mongrel w^ord, " porridge." 
Although other grains were cultivated and white 
bread was at first most popular, and rye bread 
well known, yet Indian corn was always the great 
staple for the making of what Defoe calls " the 
staff of life." Beside the various kinds of pud- 
dings and bake-stuff made from the cereal grains, 
pease and beans were much employed for soups 



FOOD, DBESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 267 

and stews. Other vegetables cultivated and used 
were pumpkins, beans, squashes, turnips, par- 
snips, and onions. In the course of time, in the 
Dutch ovens, which the Pilgrim women knew so 
well how to use, began the evolution of those 
substantial and nutritious dishes, baked beans, 
brown bread, codfish balls, and pumpkin pies. 
Other delicacies, such as strawberry shortcake, for 
which New England has a well-deserved reputa- 
tion, either as every-day affairs, as Sunday morn- 
ing features, or as dishes in season, took their 
places upon the tables. 

Fresh fish was always common, but unsalted 
beef, mutton, and lamb were not. After the ex- 
cellent stock of the imported Dutch and English 
cattle had multiplied, the products of the cow 
were abundant and much enjoyed. Butter and 
cheese were staple articles. With maize so plenty, 
the old word "corn" — which was Dutch before 
it was English — came to mean the corn, that 
is, maize. Since fish, both salt and fresh, was 
every-day food, the term " meat " was gradually 
restricted to what is raised on land and furnished 
by the butcher, and not drawn from the sea and 
provided by the fisherman, so that the phrase 
" butcher's meat " fell out of vogue. Instead of 
being used as the opposite of drink, the word 
referred to flesh food only. 

Gradually there grew up a necessary and proper 
difference in some phases of English as spoken 



268 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

on this side of the Atlantic, As fashions changed 
and thought widened on both sides of the ocean, 
language grew, and there were deaths and survi- 
vals of words not known except to scholars and 
critical readers of Shakespeare. What are called 
" Americanisms " by the ill-informed are often 
living descendants of very old-fashioned English 
speech. Not a few such expressions still used in 
the Eastern States are classic English, and may 
be found, not only in the poets and prose writers 
before the age of the Stuarts, but even yet in 
rural England. 

We are certain about one thing, and that is 
that these God-fearing and God-loving people 
always looked first to the Giver of their refresh- 
ment and sustenance, never eating until they had 
bowed their head to " say grace " or rising from 
the table until they had returned thanks. These 
joyful Pilgrims were not drunk with wine, where- 
in is excess, but they were filled with the spirit. 
They reveled in the life of the soul as well as in 
that of the body. To a Plymouth dinner of boiled 
clams and a cup of cold water, they brought as 
grateful hearts as when before an English feast 
or a Leyden banquet. Good digestion waited 
on appetite, health on both, and genuinely filial 
religion over all. 

How did they dress ? It is not very difficult 
to answer this question, for the abundant oil 
paintings, etchings, copper and wood cuts of Hoi- 



FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 269 

land and the prints and literature of England, 
with their own records and relics, make the matter 
tolerably plain. Muslin or cotton goods were 
very rare until the days of the Plymouth Colony 
were nearly over, but wool, hemp, and flax were 
staple materials. 

Linen being very cheap in Holland during the 
seventeenth century, we are not surprised that 
men, maids, and matrons were well provided with 
stores of uapery, which they used with assthetic 
effect upon their tables as well as in their out- 
ward clothing. Stiffened with starch, the snowy 
fabric helped conspicuously to make a costume 
that was beautiful and serviceable. The true 
Puritan, whether in France or Holland or Eng- 
land, dressed neatly and becomingly in a style 
that would have delighted an ancient Greek, even 
as it charms many a modern artist. 

In the first generation of their history in the 
old home-land, the Puritans wore woolen coats, 
and breeches which ended at the knee and were 
tied together with strings having ornamented 
tags, their lower limbs being encased in stockings 
or hose. In the second generation starch and 
linen became more common. The old ruff had 
disappeared, and in its place was the rolling or 
falling collar, usually tied with a white string and 
tassels. 

The dress of the women was simple but un- 
questionably artistic. We ma}^ be quite sure 



270 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

that, Pilgrims though they were, the Plymouth 
maids were particular about getting the proper fit 
of shoe, and wearing their stockings without ridges 
or loose wrinkles. Their skirts were sensibly 
short, and they were warmly dressed in woolen 
material, their bodices being either made plainly 
or laced together over some white or bright 
colored underdress, while at their shoulders and 
sleeves they were fond of slashing or ojDening the 
woolen fabric so as to show the white underdress. 
Upon their heads they wore linen caps of snow- 
like hue, or often simply a top piece with lace, 
and they had lace at the end of their cuffs toward 
the shoulders. Over their bosoms and shoulders 
they usually wore, in time of rest or on special 
occasions, a white handkerchief, or often one large 
handkerchief underneath, with a smaller one like 
a collar over it, displaying their throat and a little 
of the upper chest. In the season of frost and 
ice, they had often a bow and necktie also. Some- 
times this upper white dress had a lace fringe at 
the bottom, going around the shoulders and higher 
part of the bust. Doubtless the long gauntleted 
gloves were not absent. In winter time, at least, 
the bonnets or close fitting caps of velvet did not 
lack either bows at the top or strings gracefully 
tied under the chin. 

No perverted theories of Puritanism, however 
rigid, could kill or conceal the innate love of 
beauty which God has implanted in woman's 



FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 271 

nature. While kings and queens, gallants and 
ladies might think themselves properly arrayed 
in costumes which more properly befitted the 
theatre, the Puritans, not " in spite of them- 
selves," but guided by the unerring law of Greek 
art and of eternal beauty, which lays more stress 
on form than on decoration, created a becoming 
and beautiful type of dress. Having the sheep 
of the meadow, the flax of the garden, and his 
own inventive ability, man, male and female, can 
dress beautifully without the silkworm or the 
cotton plant. 

The spinning-wheel, the direct evolution of the 
ancient distaff and spindle in union, said to have 
been invented at Nuremberg so late as 1530, 
came into Holland first, and then into England, 
and displaced the old whorl-stones, holding its 
own unt.il the present century. The deft fingers 
of the Pilgrim mothers and daughters became 
very expert in using the spinning-wheel and in 
making the material for the garments of hus- 
bands, children, and kinsfolk. Quite early in the 
history of the colony, knitting became an industry 
especially favored by women in their few hours 
left over from severer toil. 

Unlike the Bay Colony, Plymouth never made 
any law regulating personal costume, and in gen- 
eral kept free of sumptuary legislation. Yet 
this matter of dress, or rather the necessity of 
providing the material for it, had become serious 



272 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

in New Plymouth when in 1633 it was forbidden 
to exj)ort any sheep. In 1639 every houseliolder 
was ordered to sow at least one square rod of flax 
or hemp. It was only gradually that the distinct 
trade of webster or weaver became known and 
recognized in the colony. 

Cotton was a great novelty when it made its 
appearance in New England from the West In- 
dies. This " tree wool " was not woven in Eng- 
land until the eighteenth century, being only 
rarely seen as a great curiosity. It is no wonder, 
then, that its nature was not at first well under- 
stood. Several children in New England, when 
first dressed in cotton clothes, were burned to 
death, and one man whose cotton clothes took 
fire saved his life by jumping into a well. When, 
however, the English Civil War broke out, and 
imports from the home-land were much curtailed, 
wool became dearer, and cotton was much used 
for weaving and clothing. By about the year 
1666, clothing was so abundant and often made 
into such attractive forms, that the rather super- 
stitious Morton ascribed the loss of the wheat 
crop to the wrath of God against the " licentious- 
ness of apparel." 

Without doubt both Pilgrim and Puritan, with- 
out being foppish or dandyish, set sufficient store 
upon good clothes. They knew well how great, 
how continuous was the influence of proper garb 
upon good manners and even upon character. 



FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 273 

Marriage was a frequent episode of life in New 
Plymouth, for such a thing as an unmarried wo- 
man could hardly be known while so many single 
men wanted mates. There could be no perma- 
nent widows or widowers in such primitive life, 
where the necessity of providing food, and there- 
fore of working hard, was so urgent, for both the 
most and the best of men's work is done when 
he has a helpmate with him. Time could not be 
spared for long mourning or periods of seclusion, 
and the conventionalities of older and more fin- 
ished society were out of place. 

Very simple indeed were the ceremonies of 
these first weddings. Both out of principle and 
from necessity, they were, as Bradford says, after 
" the laudable custom of the Low Countries." 
The Pilgrims were Calvinists in their theories. 
Calvinism, which means realism in religion, did 
not at first, nor does it now, see any necessity for 
the minister of religion to be present either at 
the marriage altar, at the grave, or at the infant's 
birth, except as an invited servant ; though it 
teaches that God presides over all and that to 
him each act of man should be consecrated. 
Believing in the priesthood of all true believers 
and the equality of all redeemed souls before 
God, it holds that no child born of Christian 
parents is unclean. Those Calvinists who admit 
infants to holy baptism justify it upon the faith 
of its parents as the true channel of divine grace 
and fulfillment of the divine promises. Calvinism 



274 FOOD, DRESS, AND SOCIAL LIFE 

teaches tliat marriage is a mystery of love, the 
fire of God, the union in holy wedlock for the 
continuance of the race, and the maintenance of 
purity and obedience to the commands of God. 
It considers the so-called " consecrated ground " 
as the invention of sectarian priestcraft and an 
outrage upon our common humanity. 

This being their belief the Pilgrims could not 
see the need of the " professional mercenary " of 
the ecclesiastical corporation, even though they 
might invite and tinjoy the presence and services 
of the modest servant of God and of the church, 
the minister of the Word. Death, to the believer 
in Christ who takes the New Testament as his 
sole guide, is the union of earth to earth, the 
honorable return of the dissolved earthly house 
to its original elements, and the rejoining of the 
spirit to its first home with God. The Pilgrims 
did not therefore feel that any religious services 
at the grave-side were necessary, though they felt 
free to have these if they desired. 

In New Plymouth the grand simplicity and 
divine sufficiency in Christ of men who knew 
their Bibles well enabled them to marry, to bury, 
and to bring up their children without the aid of 
diocesan bishops, church corporations, or priests, 
or kings. They had, under God, created a state 
where none of these things were needed. They 
laid the foundation of a nation in which priest 
and pastor will ever be servants and not masters 
of the congregation. 



CHAPTER XXII 

CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

The Pilgrim wedding ceremony was very sim- 
ple. The couple were joined in wedlock by the 
magistrate, though prayer was not omitted. The 
first marriage took place in the lovely month of 
May, 1621, when Edward Winslow, whose wife 
had died but seven weeks before, married Susanna 
White, a widow with children, whose husband 
had died twelve weeks before. Mrs. White was 
the mother of Peregrine, the first child born of 
white parents in New England. Another son, 
born after her second marriage, became governor 
of an American colony, so that this Pilgrim 
mother has a triple honor. Yet about this his- 
toric wedding no poetry has been written, nor of 
it has any picture been painted or printed. The 
Pilgrim fathers have had their meed of fame ; 
but the story of the Pilgrim mothers, could it be 
told aright, would at most points be of equal fas- 
cination. 

The imagination of poet and artist and popular 
interest have gathered around another episode of 
love, courtship, and marriage, all three elements 
of which were doubtless as simple in all their 



276 CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

appointments and circumstances as were those 
which made Edward Winslow and Susanna 
White one ; and this, notwithstanding that the 
dramatic incidents tohl in the hexameters of 
Longfellow are probably every one of them purely 
imaginary, and several of them decidedly anachro- 
nistic. Nevertheless, a majority of first readers 
of " The Courtship of Miles Standish," and many 
editors and orators, accept this poem as genuine 
history. In Longfellow's metrical romance, the 
soldier - widower sends " John Alden, the fair- 
haired taciturn stripling," as his agent to win 
Priscilla Mullins' love ; but the doughty captain 
is not the one desired of the maiden, and she 
hints to the gallant envoy to speak for himself, 
which, of course, he does. The wedding takes 
place ; but when the service is ended, the som- 
bre, powerful, and armor-clad figure strides in, 
grasps the bridegroom's hand, and asks forgive- 
ness. Applying the proverb, " No man can gather 
cherries in Kent at the season of Christmas," 
he implies that no graybeard can equal a hand- 
some youth in pleading for the hand and heart 
of a maiden still in life's springtime. Taking 
each other for husband and wife in the magis- 
trate's presence, " after the Puritan way and the 
laudable custom of Holland," the bridegroom and 
the bride go forth and stand at the doorway, 
while the friends scatter for the labors of the 
day. Then, from a stall near at hand, amid 




Mm 



CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 277 

exclamations of wonder, Alden brings out his 
" snow-white bull " covered with crimson cloth, 
and led by a cord that was tied to an iron ring in 
his muzzle. A cushion is placed for a saddle, 
that she may ride like a queen on a palfrey, and 
not tread along like a peasant. Bride and groom 
move to their new habitation, crossing the ford 
in the forest. As one pair 

" ill the endless succession of lovers, 
So through the Plymouth woods passed onward the bi'idal 
procession." 

The pictures of John Alden and Priscilla Mul- 
ling at their courting show a style of house and 
furniture probably never seen in old Plymouth 
colony. 

As a simple matter of fact, there were no cattle 
in the colony at this time, and in a little hamlet 
with one short street and houses close together, 
the bridal tour or procession could not have been 
very long in time or far in space. Nevertheless, 
we doubt not that the young couple were as happy 
as if they had been married in a great cathedral 
with the light streaming in through stained glass, 
and even with the wedding procession, as in our 
day, fashionably slow and solemn. 

The whole life of the English Separatists was 
like that set forth in the wonderful pilgrim psalms 
in that oldest hymn-book of the Church of God, 
which is written in Hebrew. Theirs was ever " a 
Song of Ascents." Like good Christians, who 



278 CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

knew by sweet experience every one of the bless- 
ings named in the Fifth Book of the Psalms, 
from Number CXX to CXL, each Pilgrim father 
counted it a great and continual joy to have in 
his home a " fruitful vine " and plenty of " olive 
plants " around his table. He rejoiced to have 
his quiver full. John Alden and his Priscilla 
were especially permitted to enter into the joys 
of the 127th and 128th Psalms. The bride's 
father and mother, with their son, a young man, 
had died in the first winter's sickness. 

Instead of her father, God gave her sons, who 
with their descendants became as princes in the 
earth, and her name will be remembered in all 
generations. 

John and Priscilla Alden had eleven children, 
and were both living in 1650, by which time Pris- 
cilla was a grandmother, her oldest daughter 
having a husband and five children. To-day the 
descendants of John Alden are like the stars of 
the heavens in multitude. 

As the first marriage was between Edward 
Winslow and Mrs. White, it is probable that 
John Alden with Priscilla MuUins made the sec- 
ond, Francis Eaton with Mrs. Carver's servant- 
maid the third, Bradford with Mrs. Alice South- 
worth the fourth, and Standish with a lady named 
Barbara, whose family name is not known, the fifth, 
John Rowland with Elizabeth Tilley the sixth, 
and Peter Brown with Mrs. Ford the seventh. 



CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 279 

No divorces are heard of at Plymouth until 
forty-one years had passed away, when one wo- 
man, on scriptural grounds, obtained a divorce 
from her husband, who, after being publicly 
whipped, left the colony. After this, only six 
cases of divorce are known during the colony's 
existence, from 1620 to 1691. 

There are in the records cases of suits of breach 
of promise, with the amount of claim and recovery 
stated. There are instances of men making com- 
plaint that their desires of marriage with daugh- 
ters are frustrated by parents. Several times, 
the court, after hearing, punished men by threat 
of fine or whipping for urging unwilling damsels 
to receive their attentions. In one case the toler- 
ant spirit of John Howland towards the Quakers 
had angered Governor Thomas Prence, who in 
1660 brought suit against Howland's nephew for 
making love to his daughter without her father's 
permission. Nevertheless, for seven years, the 
young couple remained constant to each other. 
Then the angry father again had the young man 
brought before the court and fined five pounds, 
because he had " disorderly and unrighteously " 
endeavored to obtain the affections of his daugh- 
ter. So the patient lover was put under a bond 
of fifty pounds to refrain and desist. Neverthe- 
less, the young man and woman were, a few 
months later, united in marriage. 

Greatly to the delight of those who called the 



280 CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

Pilgrims " Brownists," and who desired and ex- 
pected that the freedom of the Plymouth Colony 
would run into anarchy, in order to have the petty 
prophet's rapture of saying " I told you so," there 
was much trouble about marriage, after the death 
of the leaders of the " old stock," on account of 
radical notions. The second generation, not hav- 
ing won, but only inherited their liberty, went 
further than the Dutch, who, after instituting 
civil marriage, safeguarded it most scrupulously. 
The Plymouth uprooters went so far as to marry 
themselves, or to get persons without authority to 
perform the wedding ceremony. In 1654 one 
man was fined five pounds for disorderly mar- 
riage, and then fined five pounds again ; and noti- 
fied that he would be fined every three months, 
until he came to be married by a magistrate. 
Later on, three others were mulcted for the same 
offense. 

Perhaps the severity of the Plymouth rulers 
defeated the very end which they had in view, of 
maintaining personal purity throughout the whole 
colony. It does not necessarily follow that the 
morality of the time or place was below the aver- 
age in America or England to-day, for no such 
diligence of search and observation is now known, 
as was then and there in vogue, nor is the machin- 
ery of the law so perfect for the discovery of 
wrong-doing in social matters. Indeed, consider- 
ing the abundance and minuteness of the writings 



CUSTOMS AND SUrSRSTITIONS 281 

concerning the Plymouth men and women and 
the consequent publicity for all time, their record 
of general morality is a noble one. 

Some of the court proceedings show that both 
men and women used their tongues in a lively 
sort of way, calling each other vile names very 
freely. The magistrates, believing that the tongue 
being a world of iniquity was sometimes set on 
fire of Gehenna, punished misuse of this member 
very severely. When men, by living a vagrant 
life in the woods, did not treat or support their 
wives properly, — a disorder very common on the 
frontier, and one from which the French settle- 
ments in Canada suffered mortally, — they were 
heavily fined. Masters for not instructing their 
apprentices properly, and any persons for telling 
lies, were also punished by fines. One man who 
averred that he had seen a whale when none else 
had, was fined twenty shillings. Evidently the 
sea serpent that swims in the newspapers had not 
then been invented, though even then, on most 
European maps, all sorts of mythical monsters 
disported themselves. Another man who told a 
fib, the size or quality of which is not stated, was 
fined ten shillings ; but the wife of another named 
George who lied not perniciously, but "only "un- 
advisedly," was discharged. 

The records seem to show that at Plymouth, as 
elsewhere, men not unfrequently tried to make 
public justice an instrument of private revenge. 



282 CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

We find a number of cases of fines for card-play- 
ing ; but although there were laws against " the 
devil's picture-books," with the penalty of corpo- 
ral punishments, yet we do not learn that they 
were executed. No doubt a good deal of idle 
play with colored pasteboard was had privately, 
in barns and garrets, during which probably very 
little gambling was done. Stolen water was 
sweet and bread eaten in secret pleasant then, as 
in pre-ancient and modern times. A prohibition 
and " thou shalt not " are always challenges. A 
positive command to do something good is always 
the best way of making the Everlasting Kingdom 
come, and the founders of Plymouth knew and 
believed in Christ's way. It is not so certain that 
their immediate successors did, at least in equal 
measure. 

Society in New Plymouth in 1665 was less 
under the dominion of enlightened Christian gen- 
tlemen than it had been in 1625, and was more 
under the control of a clerical caste. In a word, 
Plymouth Christianity was then more like that in 
a state church, and under the politics of paternal- 
ism. Aft^ 1650 we find several cases of men 
fined and set in the stocks for staying away from 
worship and preaching, or for not speaking with 
sufficient respect of the preachers, who probably 
were both scholastic and prosy. Dr. Matthew 
Fuller opposed the new law which laid a compul- 
sory tax for the support of the clergy. For this 



CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 283 

he was fined fifty shillings. Christians who were 
Christ-like in their conduct toward the Friends 
were prosecuted before the courts and fined by 
those who were bitter against the " Quakers," — 
the charge being that they were absent from 
church when they ought to have been there. 
When sickness and poor crops troubled the super- 
stitious, they held a fast to avert " the Lord's 
wrath" as shown in his not having made more 
effectual their brutal and devilish treatment of 
the Quakers ; all of which seems wonderfully like 
the Israelitish worship of Jehovah through Mo- 
loch. Other persons were arrested for not paying 
the clergy tax. Men were whipped for reviling 
the parson. In the suits which ministers brought 
against free-speaking people they were very apt 
to win their case. All this helped to bring Brad- 
ford's gray hairs in sorrow to the grave. 

The superstitions of the Plymouth men are 
worth studying. Bi'adford and the leaders of the 
Leyden church were for their age, and as men 
inheriting the relics of Norse or Germanic pagan- 
ism, remarkably free from gross notions generated 
from ignorance. Indeed, throughout his life and 
in his writings, Bradford shows that he was a 
devout and a scientific man. He did not make 
his whims or his ignorance pass for religion. He 
kept his Christianity free from degrading super- 
stition, which is so much and so often associated 
with piety and so much nourished or winked at by 
the clergy for the sake of power over the vulgar. 



284 CUSTOMS AND SUPERSTITIONS 

Eleven years in Holland under the training of 
Kobinson, and a decade in a university town, had 
greatly clarified and purified the minds of tlie 
Plymouth leaders from superstition ; but many of 
the second generation in the wilderness were vic- 
tims to the fear of earthquake, lightning, comets, 
and signs in the heaven and earth. In this they 
were just like pagans, uncivilized men, and weak 
Christians, who sujjpose that ignorancie and fear 
which it breeds are parts of religion. A comet 
was usually supposed to portend calamities, like 
war, smallpox, or the plague. In a great tail of 
gas, they saw the Almighty's sword of vengeance. 

Altogether, the contrast between the compara- 
tive freedom from superstition of the Plymouth 
old comers, who were mostly from Holland, and 
those of the Puritans, who came directly from 
England, is remarkable. There was a constant 
habit among the latter, though not wholly confined 
to them, of attributing current events to direct 
supernatural intervention. Often the record of 
the writer's subjective fancies is comical. For 
example, Winthrop, who did not like the English 
prayer-book, tells us that his son in Connecticut 
had the Greek Testament, the Psalms, and the 
prayer-book bound in one volume, and this with 
others was hept in a room where their corn was 
stored. The mice, neglecting the other books, 
gnawed entirely through the prayer-book, and left 
everything else in the volume untouched. What 
intelligent mice ! 



CHAPTER XXIII 

THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 

Scarcely seventeen summers had passed away 
in New Plymouth before the wise men of the 
settlement began to feel the need of union with 
the other colonies. 

The quarrels of the Old had been transported 
to the New World. It was a very uncertain ques- 
tion as to who should possess North America, — 
French, Spanish, Dutch, or English. The Indian 
problem was serious. Little help could be looked 
for from the home-land, with such sovereigns as 
the Stuarts on the thi-one. All Great Britain was 
in commotion on account of the approaching Scot- 
tish and civil wars. 

The Plymouth men had seen the advantages 
of union and federal government in their second 
home. The motto of the Dutch republic, " Een- 
dracht maagt macht " (unity makes strength), 
was to them a household word. In the Cono-ress 
of the United States which met at the Hague, the 
watchword, in sight of all, was " By concord, little 
things become great." Their life as Pilgrims 
had also proved the truth of the 133d Psalm. 
They also knew the perils and the limitations of 
federal government. 



286 THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 

lu the annual synod in Boston in 1637, a civil 
league was proiDosed. The Plymouth men began 
six years of discussion with the three other colo- 
nies, one in Massachusetts and two in Connecti- 
cut. The result was that in 1643 " The New 
England Confederation " was formed. It in- 
cluded the four colonies, Massachusetts Bay and 
Plymouth, Hartford and New Haven. Maine, 
New Hampshire, and Rhode Island were left out, 
for Plymouth claimed the territory first settled 
by Eoger Williams, and Massachusetts persisted, 
in spite of the Gorges family, in reckoning 
Maine and New Hampshire, notwithstanding 
Mason's claim, as within the limits of her patent. 

Two men, church members, delegates from 
each colony in the confederation, met annually in 
September, and in each of the colonies in turn. 
This little legislature of eight had charge of war 
and peace, Indian affairs, the rendition of crimi- 
nals and of rvmaway servants, the making of 
roads and communications, the assessment of ex- 
penses, and the settlement of boundary disputes. 
In education and religion, the little congress had 
only advisory power. Each colony was to man- 
age its own local affairs. 

In a word, here was the Dutch federal union 
in miniature. Connecticut, which borrowed so 
much and so closely from the republic in which 
its leaders Hooker and Davenport, like the Pil- 
grims, had for years found refuge, wanted, like 



THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 287 

the Dutch states and cities, to have a veto power. 
She even refused at first to join the league unless 
she could have it ; but the victorious Dutch, having 
humbled giant Spain, seemed to be expanding in 
New Netherland and pressing on her borders, 
while civil war, whose issue no man could fore- 
tell, had broken out in England. So Connecticut 
withdrew her opposition, the union was perfected, 
and the little congress began its sessions. As in 
the Dutch States-General, a majority or three 
fourths vote was necessary for action. 

In form the confederation lasted half a cen- 
tury, but its real life covered only about twenty 
years. It suffered from the same diseases which 
had troubled the Dutch republic. Massachusetts 
was its Holland, rich, aristocratic, dictatoi-ial, 
wanting to use power instead of giving advice, 
too little inclined to union and helpful coopera- 
tion, and too much given to assertion of state- 
right. No federal government can get along well 
with such a disproportionately powerful state as 
Holland in a republic, or with such a large colony 
as Massachusetts in a little colonial confederation. 
The disturbance of the system is too great. In 
1675, of the 43,000 people in the confederation, 
about one half were in Massachusetts Bay, with 
7000 in Plymouth Colony and 14,000 in Connect- 
icut. Holland, both in guilders and in souls, was 
nearly equal to all the other six Dutch states, and 
so also Massachusetts, equal in money and num- 



288 TUE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 

bers to the others, was the controller of the 
" United Colonies of New England." Within 
a decade advisoiy power, in education and reli- 
gion, had become something very much like au- 
thority, and Puritan bigotry was undermining 
the Christian tolerance, freedom and simplicity 
of Plymouth. 

In joint stock companies the man who has a 
majority of shares can " control the stock." 
Plymouth in the New England Confederation 
found itself in the condition of the cony that had 
invited the hedgehog " in its burrow." Brad- 
ford's fable was once more illustrated. 

Even before the end of the first ten years, 
Massachusetts began to get Hollandish, and 
seemed unwilling to submit to the authority of 
the Union. In 1650, Connecticut, by permission 
of the congress, having levied taxes to support 
a fort at the mouth of the Connecticut River, 
Massachusetts, without authority, laid duties on 
the commerce of the other colonies, the pretext 
being to pay for the fort in Boston harbor. This 
unauthorized assertion of state-right or of nullifi- 
cation destroyed the Union. Thereafter it had 
only a nominal existence. 

In 1653, when the English were fighting a com- 
mercial war with the Dutch to get the carrying 
trade of the ocean, Connecticut wanted the colo- 
nies to invade New Netherland, and the congress 
passed a majority vote for war ; but Massachusetts, 



1 



THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 289 

contrary to the Constitution, demanded unanimous 
consent for offensive action. After 1663 the ses- 
sions of the congress became triennial. In 1667 
Plymouth Colony made a strong protest against 
the behavior of the predominant colony and its 
unjust emphasis laid on its " state-right." Be- 
sides wanting the capital, or the sessions of the 
congress, to be at Boston and its president a 
Massachusetts man, the largest of the colonies 
objected to the vital principle of federal govern- 
ment — the equal representation of the colonies. 
This was the soul of the Dutch republic, and is 
still the fundamental principle in the Senate of 
the United States of America. 

When the English commonwealth gave way to 
the Restoration, Charles II. paid little or no atten- 
tion to the confederation. In 1686 under James 
II. the congress of the colonies adopted a flag that 
must have pleased this royal person, if indeed he 
did not order its design. It was a huge red cross 
set upi'ight on a white ground, with the king's 
monogram and crown in gold in the centre. For 
ships, the flag was red, with a white cross resting 
on a white union of the crosses of St. Andrew and 
St. George, in the upper left-hand corner of which 
was a pine-tree. 

The last triennial session of the little federal 
congress was held in Hartford in 1684. Two 
years later, Sir Edmund Andros, the tool of that 
royal law-breaker, James II., blotted out the 



290 THE NEW ENGLAND CONFEDERATION 

Union and trampled on all law. In 1692 Gov- 
ernor Phips arrived. He was armed with au- 
thority from the Dutch king, William III., of 
Great Britain and Ireland. The charter which 
Phips bore combined Nova Scotia, Maine, the 
Vineyard Archipelago, and the colonies on Massa- 
chusetts Bay into the one British province of 
Massachusetts. New Plymouth, with her seven- 
teen towns and 13,000 people, ceased to exist, 
except as a glorious memory and a noble name. 

The poetic and heroic era of the Pilgrim story 
ended with the New Eii^land Confederation. 
" From this period, but not alone from this cause, 
Plymouth history ceases to be of continuous in- 
terest." 

Of the heroes and leaders, as well as most of 
the rank and file, we may write as the conclusion 
of our story : — 

" These all died in faith, not having received 
the promises, but having seen them and greeted 
them from afar, and having confessed that they 
were strangers and pilgrims on the earth." 

DEUS FECIT 



INDEX 



Adams, John, 131. 

Aiusworth, Heury, 73, 78, 81, 83. 

Alden, Jolin, engaged as cooper, 170 ; 
one of the owners of the planta- 
tion, 236 ; 252 ; marries Priscilla 
MuUins, 270, 277 ; his descend- 
ants, 278. 

Alden, Priscilla, 276-278. 

AUevton, Isaac, 104, 11-4, 205; his 
mission to Loudon, 23G ; his finan- 
cial mismanagement, 248. 

Allerton, Mary, 109. 

Amsterdam, 72-84. 

Anabaptists, the, 50, 66-68, 138, 139. 

Andros, Sir Edmund, 289. 

Ann, the ship, 226, 227. 

Arber, Professor Edward, his " Story 
of the Pilgrim Fathers," 134, 159. 

Arminians, the, 137, 138, 140-147. 

Arminius, James, 140. 

Aspiuet, the sachem, 223. 

Augusta, Maine, 236, 248. 

Austerfield, 4, 5, 18, 20, 22 ; church 
at, 22-25 ; synod of, 22-24. 

Baly, Persis, 111. 

Barker, Elizabeth, 109. 

Barneveldt, leader of the Arminians, 
142, 143 ; arrested, imprisoned, and 
executed, 145, 146, 148. 

Basset, William, 99. 

Basset Law, 36, 37. 

Bawtry, 20, 28, 40. 

Beaver, the trade in, 220, 247, 248. 

Bekker, Balthazar, his book " The 
Bewitched World," 214. 

Bernard, Rev. Richard, 63, 64. 

Betrothal and marriage of Pilgrims 
in Holland, 98-114. 

Billington, Francis, plays with pow- 
der, 192, 193. 

Billington, John, 255. 

Billington, John, Jr., 208. 

Billington Sea, 198. 

Block, Adrian, 177, 178. 



Bradford, William, his birthplace, 4, 
5, 12 ; his baptism, 25, 60 ; child- 
hood and youth, 60-63 ; 85 ; his be- 
trothal to Dorothy May, 103 ; his 
marriage, 105 ; becomes a citizen 
of Holland, 114 ; 118, 188, 190, 194, 
200 ; chosen governor of Plymouth 
Colony, 212 ; 215-218, 221, 223, 224, 
226, 230 ; deals summarily with re- 
volting " Particulars," 231-233 ; 
236, 239, 241, 242; marries Mrs. 
Alice Southworth, 278 ; his free- 
dom from superstition, 283. 

Bradford's " History of Plimouth 
Plantation," 4 ; quotations from, 
direct and indirect, 74, SO, 123, 146, 
152, 153, 158, 159, 163, 164, 175, 
182, 254. 

Brewer, Thomas, 124, 133-135. 

Brewster, Maria, 109. 

Brewster, William, his English home, 
13 ; early life and education, 46, 
47 ; relations with William Davi- 
son, 48-50 ; goes to Holland with 
Davison, 50-53 ; returns to Eng- 
land, 54, 55 ; with Davison at the 
court, 56 ; life at Scrooby in charge 
of the relay station, 57-59 ; his in- 
fluence with the Pilgrims, 58, 59 ; 
69, 70, 85 ; incurs the king's dis- 
pleasure by printing " Brownist " 
books, 133-135 ; 155, 161, 252. 

Brown, Peter, 278. 

Browne, Rev. Robert, 50, 66, 67. 

Brownists, the, 66-68, 83. 

Burr, Zachariah, 108. 

Butler, Mary, 99. 

Butler, Samuel, 106. 

Butterfield, Stephen, 108. 

Button, WiUiam, 175. 

Calderwood, Rev. David, 134. 
Calvinism, 139. 

Calvinists, the Dutch, 137-142, 147, 
149. 



292 



INDEX 



Cambridge, the University of, 45- 

47. 
Canonicus, chief of the Narragan- 

setts, 220. 
Cape Cod, the Pilgrims' landing on 

and exploration of, 177-195. 
Cape Cod Compact, the, 181-185. 
Card-playing, 282. 
Carey, Siirah, lOG. 
Carleton, Sir Dudley, 134, 135, 150. 
Carpenter, Alexander, 104. 
Carver, John, 107, 150, 157, 200, 206, 

207 ; death of, 212. 
Cattle of the Plymouth Colony, the, 

238. 
Champlain, Samuel, 177, 178. 
Chandler, Roger, 106. 
Cliarity, tlie ship, 222, 231, 232, 235. 
Cliilton, Mary, 200. 
Claes, Elizabeth, 107. 
Clapboard, the act of Parliament as 

to, 170. 
Clark's Island, 195. 
Clifton, Rev. Richard, 61, 63-66. 
Codmore, John, 109. 
Collins, Henry, 105. 
Connecticut, 280-288. 
Coppin, Robert, 176, 179, 192. 
Cornellison, Gisbert, 120. 
Cotton, 272. 
CruUins, Henry, 103. 
Cushman, Robert, 108, 156, 157, 171, 

232. 
Cuyp, Jakob Gerrits and Albert, 

their picture of the embarkation of 

the Pilgrims, 165-167. 

Danes, the, 16-19. 

Dartmouth, 171. 

Dates, 111. 

Davison, William, 48-50, 53-57. 

Delfshaveu, 102-109. 

Dexter, Rev. Henry Martin, D. D., 

80. 
Dinbay, Sarah, 106. 
Dinbay, William, 106. 
Divorces, at Plymouth, 279. 
Dordrecht, the Synod of, 144-146. 
Dress of the Plymouth Pilgrims, the, 

208-272. 
Dunster, Leonard, 110. 
Durie, Rev. Robert, 114, 124, 128. 
Dutch in America, the, 239-247. 
Dutch language, the, 118, 119. 
Dutch Republic. See Holland. 
Duxbury, 252. 

Eastham, 195. 
Eaton, Francis, 278. 
Elizabeth, Queen of England, 39, 41, 
42, 48, 53-56, 68. 



England, in the sixteenth century, 5- 

11, 38-44. 
Evans, Maria, 106. 

"First Encounter, The," 195. 

Fletcher, Moses, 106. 

Food of the Plymouth colony, the, 

203-268. 
Ford, Martha, widow, 219, 278. 
Forefathers' Day, 196. 
Forest, Jesse de, 149, 150, 239. 
Forks, table, 265. 
Fortune, the ship, 219, 220. 
Friesland, 115. 
Fuller, Dr. Matthew, 282. 
FuUer, Dr. Samuel, 104, 106, 175. 

Goodwin, John A., his "Pilgrim Re- 
public," 255. 

Gorges, Sir Ferdinando, 251. 

Gorges, Robert, 231. 

Government of the Plymouth Colony, 
228-230. 

Graef, Jacob Mijntje Jucosar de, 107. 

Green Harbor, 252. 

Greenwood, John, 111. 

Grindon, Prudence, 109. 

Gulf Stream, the, 178, 179. 

Haarlem, 86. 

Hamden, John, 224. 

Henry VIII., 38-40. 

Hinckley, Tliomas, 230. 

Hobomok, the Indian, 224. 

Holland, relations with England, 41, 
42, 48-55 ; civilization in the six- 
teenth century, 51, 52 ; residence 
of the Pilgrims in, 72-169 ; politi- 
cal government in, 114, 115; holi- 
days in, 121, 122 ; theological and 
political dissensions, 136-149 ; 
wholesome skepticism in, 214, 215. 

Hooper, Sarah, 109. 

Hopkins, Oceanus, 176. 

Hopkins, Stephen, 176, 188, 207. 

Houses of the Pilgrims, in Holland, 
128-132 ; in Plymouth, 197, 199, 
200, 217, 2G3. 

Howland, John, overboard at sea, 
175 ; one of the owners of the plan- 
tation, 230 ; marries Elizabeth Til- 
ley, 278 ; 279. 

Hudson, Henry, 77, 154. 

Hundreds, 37. 

Hunt, Abigail, 106. 

Hunter, Rev. John, 5. 

Indians, first meetings with, 188- 
195 ; friendly relations with, 201- 
209, 216; 218; trouble from the 
Narragansetts averted, 2'M, 221 ; 



INDEX 



293 



episode of the stolen beads, 222, 
223 ; trade with, 223, 224, 245 ; a 
murderous plot among the Massa- 
chusetts foiled, 224, 225 ; their use 
of wampum, 243-245 ; Thomas 
Morton's relations with, 249 ; law 
forbidding sale of liquor to, 264. 
Iroquois, the, 243. 

Jackson, Richard, 70. 

Jacobson, John, 242, 243. 

James I., 68, 69, 133-135, 150-154, 

235. 
Japan, feudal, 7-12. 
Jenney, John, 106. 
Jennings, John, 103. 
Jepson, Edmund, 106. 
Jepson, William, 106, 107, 126, 129. 
Johnson, Mrs. Francis, 7S-S0. 
Johnson, Rev. Francis, 65, 78, 81. 
Jones, Captain, 176, 190, 201. 

Kaerlil, Nelken, 107. 
Kaines, Catheren, 260. 
Kennebec River, the, 236, 248. 
Kist, N. C, 5. 

Lamkin, Robert, 107. 

Land ownersliip, 237, 238. 

Lee, Samuel, 109. 

Leicester, Robert Dudley, Earl of, 
53, 54. 

Leland, John, 27, 28. 

Leslie, William, 104. 

Leyden, its wealth and importance 
in 1600, 81 ; the Pilgrims settle in, 
82, 84-88 ; its industries, 88-90 ; 
early history and landmarks, 90- 
96 ; Ufe of the Pilgrims in, 97-161 ; 
education in, 117 ; the focus of po- 
litical excitement in 1619, 136. 

Little James, the pinnace, 226. 

Longfellow's " Courtship of Miles 
Standish," 276, 277. 

Lutheranism, 139. 

Lyford, John, 232, 233. 

Lysle, William, 114. 

Maize, 189-191, 206, 266. 
Manhattan, the Dutch at, 239-243, 

247. 
Marriages of PDgrims, in Holland, 

98-114; in Plymouth, 273-280. 
Marshfield, 252. 
Martin, Christopher, 157. 
Mary Queen of Scots, 56, 57. 
Massachusetts, the colony, 286-289 ; 

the province, 290. 
Massachusetts, the Indian tribe, 224, 

225. 
Massasoit, the Indian chief, 203 ; 



friendly relations with the Pil- 
grims, 205-208, 216, 224. 

Mather, Rev. Dr. Cotton, 4, 61. 

Matthews, Tobias, archbishop of 
York, 69. 

Maurice, 135 ; leader of the Union 
party in Holland, 142-146; 148; 
refuses to transport the Pilgrims to 
New Netlierland, 153-155 ; 235. 

May, Dorothy, 103-105. 

Mayflower, the, her name, 160 ; 171 ; 
sets sail from Plymouth, England, 
172 ; repaired in mid-ocean, 173, 
174 ; her company, 176, 182, 183 ; 
arrives at Cape Cod, 177-180 ; 
crosses the bay to Plymouth, 196 ; 
200 ; life and death on board, 210, 
211; 265. 

Meeting-houses, 129. 

Mekancke, Jacob, 104. 

Merchant Adventurers, the, forma- 
tion of, 15(5, 157 ; 177, 226 ; their 
disijute with the Pilgrims, 233-235 ; 
sell their interest in the colony to 
certain of the Pilgrims, 236. 

Merrymount, 249, 250. 

Middelburg, 49, 50, 67, 138. 

Middleboro, 223. 

Minther, Sarah, 107, 109. 

Monhegan, 235. 

Morrell, Rev. William, 231. 

Morton, Thomas, 104. 

Morton, Thomas, of Merrymoimt, 
249-251. 

MuUius, PrisciUa, 276-278. 

Namaschet, 209. 

Names of families, 67, 68, 88, 99-102, 
128. 

Nariies of places, 14, 16-18. 

Narragansetts, the Indian tribe, 220, 
221. 

Nauset, 195, 222. 

Netherlands. See Holland. 

Novell, or Nevyle, Gervaise, 58, 69, 
70. 

New England Confederation, the, 
286-290. 

New Netherland, settlement of, 239 ; 
desires trade with Plymouth, 239, 
240 ; a reply from Plymouth, 240, 
241 ; further relations with Ply- 
mouth, 242, 243 ; trade vvitli tlie 
Indians, 243, 244 ; internal politics, 
247. 

New Netherland Trading Company, 
the. 1.53. 

New York city, the founding of, 149, 
150. 

New York State, the founding and 
settlement of, 149, 150. 



294 



INDEX 



Newcomen, John, 255. 
Norsemen, the, 17, 18. 
Norwich, England, 41, 66, 68. 
Nottingham, 35-37, 44. 

" Old Comers," the, 161. 
"Old Stock," the, 161. 
Oldliam, John, 232, 233. 
Oldham, Margaret, 98, 99. 
Orlers, Jan, 81, 88, 92. 
Oxford, 45, 46. 

Pantes, William, 98. 

Paragon, the sliii), 226. 

"Particulars," the, 228, 231, 232, 
237. 

Peck, Janneken, 103. 

Pecksuwot, tlie Indian, 225. 

Pettenger, Dorothea, 103. 

Pettenger, Elizabeth, 103. 

Pliilips, Thomas, 111. 

Phips, Sir William, 290. 

Pilgrimage of Grace, the, 39, 40, 
43. 

Pilgrims, significance of their his- 
tory, 1-3; their origin, IV-5 ; their 
English home, 12-71 ; their home 
in Holland, 72-109 ; betrothals and 
marriages in Holland, 98-114 ; pur- 
chase land and build houses in Ley- 
den, 126-132 ; their attempts to 
propagate their doctrines, 133-135 ; 
their attitude towards Dutch Ar- 
minianism, 135, 1.36, 146-148 ; pre- 
paring for emigration, 149-lCl ; 
departure for the New World, 162- 
172 ; the voyage, 172-170 ; the laud- 
ing on Cape Cod, 177-180 ; the Cape 
Cod Compact, 181-185 ; exploring 
for a home site, 18.5-190; settle at 
Plymouth, 190-2(10 ; make friends 
■with the Indians, 201-209 ; sickness 
and death among, 210-212 ; attitude 
towards witclicraft, 212-214 ; crops 
and thanksgiving, 215-218 ; their 
numbers increased by new arrivals, 
218, 219, 222, 226 ; troubles and 
trade witli the Indians, 222-225 ; a 
discouraging summer, 225 ; domes- 
tic government and politics, 228- 
233 ; trouble with the Merchant 
Adventurers, 233-235 ; beginnings 
of a coastwise trade, 235, 236 ; a 
firm of "undertakers" acquires 
the interest of the Adventurers, 
236, 237 ; ownership of land and 
cattle among, 237, 238 ; relations 
with the Dutch in America, 239- 
247 ; a new patent for tlio colony, 
247, 248 ; success in trade, 248 ; 
trouble with Thomas Morton, 249- 



251 ; the colony extends its bounds, 
251, 252 ; law and punishment, 254- 
262 ; the food of the Plymouth 
Colony, 203-208 ; their dress, 268- 
272 ; marriages and funerals, 273- 
280 ; petty abuses of authority, 
279-283; superstitions, 283, 284; 
the colony joins a confederation of 
New England colonies, 285-2S9 ; 
the colony is merged in the Pro- 
vince of Massachusetts, 290. 

Place-names, 14, 16-18. 

Plymouth, England, 172. 

Plymouth, Mass., 177 ; found by ex- 
ploring party, 190; the Pilgrims 
settle at, 190-200; life of the Pil- 
grims at, 201-290 ; Isaac de Rasie- 
res's description of, 246, 247. 

Plymouth Colony. See Pilgrims. 

Plymouth Rock, 2, 200. 

Prince, Tliomas, 2.30, 236, 279. 

Priest, Degory, 104, 114. 

Priest, Sarah, 104. 

Punishments, 254, 255, 257-262, 279- 
283. 

Quakers, 258, 262, 283. 
Quincy, 249. 

Ras, Anna, 103. 

Rasieres, Isaac de, 240 ; visits the 
Plymouth Colony, 243, 245 ; his de- 
scription of Plymouth, 246, 247. 

Reformation in England, the, 38-40, 
43. 

RejTiolds, John, 109, 111. 

Robin Hood country, the, 35-37. 

Robinson, Bridget, UU, 111, 241. 

Robinson, Isaac, 241. 

Robinson, Rev. John, 44 ; his " A 
Justification of Separation from the 
Church of England," 64, 05; hia 
early life and persecutions, 66-68 ; 
78, 81 ; secures permission for the 
Pilgrims to reside in Leyden, 82 ; 
84, 93 ; matriculates at Leyden 
University, 124 ; his position as 
pastor, 124, 125 ; one of the agents 
of the Pilgrims in the purchase of 
land in Leyden, 120 ; 132 ; opposes 
Armiuianism, 14(), 147 ; decides 
upon removal of the Pilgrims from 
Holland, 152, 153; 1.55, 150-101, 
167, 231, 232, 234; his death, 235, 
241. 

Romanism in England, 38-40, 43. 

Saffron, 200. 
Sagadahoc, 230. 

Saint Wilfrid's Church, Scrooby, 24, 
29, 30. 



INDEX 



295 



Samoset, the Indian, welcomes the 
Pilgrims, 201-204. 

Sandwich, 223. 

Sandys, Sir Edwin, 152 ; one of the 
political forefathers of the United 
States, 155, 15G. 

Santa Clans, 122. 

Savage, James, 5. 

Scheffer, Dr. J. G. de Hoop, 5, 80, 
113, 13S. 

Scrooby, 13-16, 22, 24 ; history and 
antiquities of, 2G-34 ; 36, 38, 47. 

Sewall, WiUiam, 83. 

Sickness among the Pilgrims at Ply- 
mouth, 210-212. 

Sidney, Sir Philip, 48, 53, 55. 

Siers, Susannah, 111. 

Simons, Roger, 100. 

Singleton, Mary, 108. 

Smith, John, 109. 

Smith, Captain John, 158, 177. 

Smyth, Rev. John, 65, 78, 81. 

Southampton, 170, 171. 

Southworth, Alice, 278. 

Southworth, Edward, 103, 104. 

Speedwell, the pinnace, 158-161, 169, 
171, 172. 

Spinning-wheel, the, 271. 

Squanto, the Indian, 202, 204 ; makes 
himself useful to the Pilgrims, 
206 ; 221 ; his death, 222. 

Standish, Miles, 48, 158 ; his first 
mention in Pilgrim literature, 188 ; 
194 ; chosen captain of the military 
company, 201 •, 205, 216, 222-226, 
232, 235, 236 ; captures Thomas 
Morton and his men, 250 ; 252 ; his 
"courtship," 276 ; his marriage, 
278. 

Starter, John, 113. 

Steeu, Jan, 122. 

Stocks, the punishment of the, 254, 
258, 259. 

Stubbes, Philip, 28. 

Superstition, 283, 284. 

Swan, the ship, 222. 



Synod of Dort, the, 144-146. 

Thanksgiving Day of the Dutch, the, 

121, 215. 
Thompson, David, 226, 235. 
Tickens, Randolph, 126. 
Tilley, Edward, 188. 
Tilley, Elizabeth, 278. 
Tobacco, 47, 243, 264. 
Tracy, Stephen, 110. 
Trade, with the Indians, 223, 224, 

235, 236, 243-245, 247, 248; with 

England, 237, 247 ; with New Neth- 

erland, 243. 

" Undertakers," the, 236, 237. 
Uprising of the North, the, 39, 

43. 
Utrecht, the Union of, 136, 137. 

Wampum, 243-245, 247. 

Weddings. See Marriages. 

Weston, Thomas, 156, 169. 

Weymouth, Mass., 222, 231. 

Whipping-post, the, 261. 

White, Peregrine, 176, 275. 

White, Susanna, 275. 

Wier, John, 214. 

Wilfrid, Saint, 22-24, 29, 92. 

Williams, Roger, 103. 

Willincks, Elizabeth, 107. 

Wilson, Heraut, 107. 

Wilson, Roger, 98, 107, 114. 

Winslow, Edward, 109, 118, 147, 205, 
207, 224, 227; his "Good News 
from New England," 227; 230, 

. 232, 233, 235, 236, 252 ; marries Su- 
sanna White, 275. 

Winslow, Josiah, 2.30. 

Winthrop, John, 284. 

Witchcraft, 212-214. 

Wituwamut, the Indian, 224, 225. 

Wolsey, Cardinal, 34. 

Wood, Henry, 126. 

York, Archbishop of, 69. 



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